planetf1.com

Exediron wrote:

Tassadar wrote:I do miss the old V10 loud engines, and the really fast cars, but I understand why the changes happened.

There have never been faster cars than the current ones, so I'm not sure what you mean by this.

That's a fair point, but this a very recent development. I must recant that point, you are correct.

Although, it must be pointed out that the modern cars are only now catching up to the 2004 cars, which shows you just how beastly they were (of course, this is all to do with the rule changes). Imagine cars now with rules more like the mid-2000's. My word.

I'm not entirely convinced today's cars are quicker. Maybe in qualifying, but not race lap times. If we take today's Bahrain GP, for example, the fastest race lap in 2005 was 1:31.447, while in 2017 it was 1:32.798. In 2018 it was even slower. And the average race speeds aren't much better. In 2005 they completed the race in 1:29:18, while it took them nearly 3 minutes longer to complete the race in 2017 - 1:32:01 - and another minute longer to do that last year It seems the cars pace themselves a lot more now than they did in the past and the actual races are a fair amount slower than 14 years ago!

Caveat here is if the track hasn't changed, of course. From what I can see it changed briefly around 2010 but changed back again in 2012, so I think the above is right!

It's the same at Melbourne, another circuit which I think hasn't changed. The lap record in 2004 was 1:24.125, while this year Bottas' banzai lap was 1:25.580, while it took them more than a minute longer to complete the race this year than in 2004.

So if I look at that I'm wondering what exactly Formula One has gained in the last 15 years or so. Costs have risen astronomically, while races have actually gotten slower. Not a magnificent return on investment it has to be said.

Zoue wrote:I'm not entirely convinced today's cars are quicker. Maybe in qualifying, but not race lap times. If we take today's Bahrain GP, for example, the fastest race lap in 2005 was 1:31.447, while in 2017 it was 1:32.798. In 2018 it was even slower. And the average race speeds aren't much better. In 2005 they completed the race in 1:29:18, while it took them nearly 3 minutes longer to complete the race in 2017 - 1:32:01 - and another minute longer to do that last year It seems the cars pace themselves a lot more now than they did in the past and the actual races are a fair amount slower than 14 years ago!

Caveat here is if the track hasn't changed, of course. From what I can see it changed briefly around 2010 but changed back again in 2012, so I think the above is right!

It's the same at Melbourne, another circuit which I think hasn't changed. The lap record in 2004 was 1:24.125, while this year Bottas' banzai lap was 1:25.580, while it took them more than a minute longer to complete the race this year than in 2004.

So if I look at that I'm wondering what exactly Formula One has gained in the last 15 years or so. Costs have risen astronomically, while races have actually gotten slower. Not a magnificent return on investment it has to be said.

Bottas's fastest lap was set on much older tyres (and not on the fastest tyre available) than in 2004 as they did shorter stints. Race pace was also faster because the cars start the race with 105kg of fuel, double what they used to carry. Today they they are doing longer stints in fuel-heavier* cars.

Note, the cars are also much heavier than in 2004 as well, however as this is a fundamental property of the 'car' it's should not be factored into the performance differential. As a consequence of having that extra weight they get goodies like HERS, KERS and DRS.

Race pace is also far more controlled, by teams only going as fast as they have to because the engines have to last for 7-8 races. Again, I'm not going to count the reduced performance from having a longer life engine as a property against it, but it will affect how much the drivers will push, thus increasing the race time. Ie, the car could go faster, but when it's not worth risking engine life they won't do it.

I think the cars now are broadly equivalent in performance to the cars from 2004, but if there was a one race season (ie, not worrying about car wear), with brand new cars from both eras, today's cars would win every time.

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:I'm not entirely convinced today's cars are quicker. Maybe in qualifying, but not race lap times. If we take today's Bahrain GP, for example, the fastest race lap in 2005 was 1:31.447, while in 2017 it was 1:32.798. In 2018 it was even slower. And the average race speeds aren't much better. In 2005 they completed the race in 1:29:18, while it took them nearly 3 minutes longer to complete the race in 2017 - 1:32:01 - and another minute longer to do that last year It seems the cars pace themselves a lot more now than they did in the past and the actual races are a fair amount slower than 14 years ago!

Caveat here is if the track hasn't changed, of course. From what I can see it changed briefly around 2010 but changed back again in 2012, so I think the above is right!

It's the same at Melbourne, another circuit which I think hasn't changed. The lap record in 2004 was 1:24.125, while this year Bottas' banzai lap was 1:25.580, while it took them more than a minute longer to complete the race this year than in 2004.

So if I look at that I'm wondering what exactly Formula One has gained in the last 15 years or so. Costs have risen astronomically, while races have actually gotten slower. Not a magnificent return on investment it has to be said.

Bottas's fastest lap was set on much older tyres (and not on the fastest tyre available) than in 2004 as they did shorter stints. Race pace was also faster because the cars start the race with 105kg of fuel, double what they used to carry. Today they they are doing longer stints in fuel-heavier* cars.

Note, the cars are also much heavier than in 2004 as well, however as this is a fundamental property of the 'car' it's should not be factored into the performance differential. As a consequence of having that extra weight they get goodies like HERS, KERS and DRS.

Race pace is also far more controlled, by teams only going as fast as they have to because the engines have to last for 7-8 races. Again, I'm not going to count the reduced performance from having a longer life engine as a property against it, but it will affect how much the drivers will push, thus increasing the race time. Ie, the car could go faster, but when it's not worth risking engine life they won't do it.

I think the cars now are broadly equivalent in performance to the cars from 2004, but if there was a one race season (ie, not worrying about car wear), with brand new cars from both eras, today's cars would win every time.

Sure, but if it's all just potential it's worthless to us as viewers. The fact is that in 2004/5 races were run quicker (admittedly a small sample) so while the cars may be engineering miracles they haven't made any steps that translate to extra performance on track. And the other factor of course is if they had allowed natural evolution instead of forcing a particular path then how much quicker would the cars be? I'd suggest a damn sight quicker than they are now, in races and qualifying.

It is what it is and I'm not naive enough to think I'll change anything but the point I was making is that the claim the cars today are quicker than at any point in the past doesn't really translate to what we see for ourselves. Qualifying aside, races now are objectively slower than they were nearly 15 years ago. Which means the cars in their current state are also slower.

Zoue wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:I'm not entirely convinced today's cars are quicker. Maybe in qualifying, but not race lap times. If we take today's Bahrain GP, for example, the fastest race lap in 2005 was 1:31.447, while in 2017 it was 1:32.798. In 2018 it was even slower. And the average race speeds aren't much better. In 2005 they completed the race in 1:29:18, while it took them nearly 3 minutes longer to complete the race in 2017 - 1:32:01 - and another minute longer to do that last year It seems the cars pace themselves a lot more now than they did in the past and the actual races are a fair amount slower than 14 years ago!

Caveat here is if the track hasn't changed, of course. From what I can see it changed briefly around 2010 but changed back again in 2012, so I think the above is right!

It's the same at Melbourne, another circuit which I think hasn't changed. The lap record in 2004 was 1:24.125, while this year Bottas' banzai lap was 1:25.580, while it took them more than a minute longer to complete the race this year than in 2004.

So if I look at that I'm wondering what exactly Formula One has gained in the last 15 years or so. Costs have risen astronomically, while races have actually gotten slower. Not a magnificent return on investment it has to be said.

Bottas's fastest lap was set on much older tyres (and not on the fastest tyre available) than in 2004 as they did shorter stints. Race pace was also faster because the cars start the race with 105kg of fuel, double what they used to carry. Today they they are doing longer stints in fuel-heavier* cars.

Note, the cars are also much heavier than in 2004 as well, however as this is a fundamental property of the 'car' it's should not be factored into the performance differential. As a consequence of having that extra weight they get goodies like HERS, KERS and DRS.

Race pace is also far more controlled, by teams only going as fast as they have to because the engines have to last for 7-8 races. Again, I'm not going to count the reduced performance from having a longer life engine as a property against it, but it will affect how much the drivers will push, thus increasing the race time. Ie, the car could go faster, but when it's not worth risking engine life they won't do it.

I think the cars now are broadly equivalent in performance to the cars from 2004, but if there was a one race season (ie, not worrying about car wear), with brand new cars from both eras, today's cars would win every time.

Sure, but if it's all just potential it's worthless to us as viewers. The fact is that in 2004/5 races were run quicker (admittedly a small sample) so while the cars may be engineering miracles they haven't made any steps that translate to extra performance on track. And the other factor of course is if they had allowed natural evolution instead of forcing a particular path then how much quicker would the cars be? I'd suggest a damn sight quicker than they are now, in races and qualifying.

It is what it is and I'm not naive enough to think I'll change anything but the point I was making is that the claim the cars today are quicker than at any point in the past doesn't really translate to what we see for ourselves. Qualifying aside, races now are objectively slower than they were nearly 15 years ago. Which means the cars in their current state are also slower.

I agree with your point about the perception being that they are not much faster, however I want to clarify that I was quite deliberate not to mention how clever the engineering was in the current cars.

If they ran a 2004/5 car today, they would run it slower, strategy has evolved so much that they know much better when they don't need to push. However - conversely - I think it should also be pointed out that if people aren't knowing enough to know the details of the technology, then they also won't be informed enough to be comparing race duration times, and even if they did and saw they were 1 minute slower over a 2 hours race, I think most people wouldn't think that was particularly significant. Broadly speaking, people know to book out 90 minutes to 2 hours to watch an F1 race in the afternoon - even in 2009 after the aero regs got much stricter, it didn't bump the race times up by any meaningful amount.

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:I'm not entirely convinced today's cars are quicker. Maybe in qualifying, but not race lap times. If we take today's Bahrain GP, for example, the fastest race lap in 2005 was 1:31.447, while in 2017 it was 1:32.798. In 2018 it was even slower. And the average race speeds aren't much better. In 2005 they completed the race in 1:29:18, while it took them nearly 3 minutes longer to complete the race in 2017 - 1:32:01 - and another minute longer to do that last year It seems the cars pace themselves a lot more now than they did in the past and the actual races are a fair amount slower than 14 years ago!

Caveat here is if the track hasn't changed, of course. From what I can see it changed briefly around 2010 but changed back again in 2012, so I think the above is right!

It's the same at Melbourne, another circuit which I think hasn't changed. The lap record in 2004 was 1:24.125, while this year Bottas' banzai lap was 1:25.580, while it took them more than a minute longer to complete the race this year than in 2004.

So if I look at that I'm wondering what exactly Formula One has gained in the last 15 years or so. Costs have risen astronomically, while races have actually gotten slower. Not a magnificent return on investment it has to be said.

Bottas's fastest lap was set on much older tyres (and not on the fastest tyre available) than in 2004 as they did shorter stints. Race pace was also faster because the cars start the race with 105kg of fuel, double what they used to carry. Today they they are doing longer stints in fuel-heavier* cars.

Note, the cars are also much heavier than in 2004 as well, however as this is a fundamental property of the 'car' it's should not be factored into the performance differential. As a consequence of having that extra weight they get goodies like HERS, KERS and DRS.

Race pace is also far more controlled, by teams only going as fast as they have to because the engines have to last for 7-8 races. Again, I'm not going to count the reduced performance from having a longer life engine as a property against it, but it will affect how much the drivers will push, thus increasing the race time. Ie, the car could go faster, but when it's not worth risking engine life they won't do it.

I think the cars now are broadly equivalent in performance to the cars from 2004, but if there was a one race season (ie, not worrying about car wear), with brand new cars from both eras, today's cars would win every time.

Sure, but if it's all just potential it's worthless to us as viewers. The fact is that in 2004/5 races were run quicker (admittedly a small sample) so while the cars may be engineering miracles they haven't made any steps that translate to extra performance on track. And the other factor of course is if they had allowed natural evolution instead of forcing a particular path then how much quicker would the cars be? I'd suggest a damn sight quicker than they are now, in races and qualifying.

It is what it is and I'm not naive enough to think I'll change anything but the point I was making is that the claim the cars today are quicker than at any point in the past doesn't really translate to what we see for ourselves. Qualifying aside, races now are objectively slower than they were nearly 15 years ago. Which means the cars in their current state are also slower.

I agree with your point about the perception being that they are not much faster, however I want to clarify that I was quite deliberate not to mention how clever the engineering was in the current cars.

If they ran a 2004/5 car today, they would run it slower, strategy has evolved so much that they know much better when they don't need to push. However - conversely - I think it should also be pointed out that if people aren't knowing enough to know the details of the technology, then they also won't be informed enough to be comparing race duration times, and even if they did and saw they were 1 minute slower over a 2 hours race, I think most people wouldn't think that was particularly significant. Broadly speaking, people know to book out 90 minutes to 2 hours to watch an F1 race in the afternoon - even in 2009 after the aero regs got much stricter, it didn't bump the race times up by any meaningful amount.

Yes I take your point about strategy evolution, but I think that's exacerbated by the fact that today's cars have to conserve everything because they have to make them last multiple races, while in 2004/5 that wasn't the case. So there was no need for them to try to run things slower and they could just go out and have fun.

So with that in mind, I'm not sure I'd agree that if you were to run a 2004/5 car today (as a kind of late entrant!), but letting the 2004/5 car run to the same regs and tyres etc as in its day, it would be beaten be today's cars. Today strategy has taken a much more prominent role because of the saving mentality already mentioned, but in 2004/5 they had much freer reign to push. Which brings me back to my question on whether all the developments of the last 15 years have actually brought any progress, given that the cars are slower than they used to be (by virtue of having to be held back, maybe), but the costs have risen through the roof. I know this ship has sailed but personally I'd rather them have throwaway engines and gearboxes they could replace every race than ones which cost ten times as much but which they had to nurse every weekend.

Zoue wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:I'm not entirely convinced today's cars are quicker. Maybe in qualifying, but not race lap times. If we take today's Bahrain GP, for example, the fastest race lap in 2005 was 1:31.447, while in 2017 it was 1:32.798. In 2018 it was even slower. And the average race speeds aren't much better. In 2005 they completed the race in 1:29:18, while it took them nearly 3 minutes longer to complete the race in 2017 - 1:32:01 - and another minute longer to do that last year It seems the cars pace themselves a lot more now than they did in the past and the actual races are a fair amount slower than 14 years ago!

Caveat here is if the track hasn't changed, of course. From what I can see it changed briefly around 2010 but changed back again in 2012, so I think the above is right!

It's the same at Melbourne, another circuit which I think hasn't changed. The lap record in 2004 was 1:24.125, while this year Bottas' banzai lap was 1:25.580, while it took them more than a minute longer to complete the race this year than in 2004.

So if I look at that I'm wondering what exactly Formula One has gained in the last 15 years or so. Costs have risen astronomically, while races have actually gotten slower. Not a magnificent return on investment it has to be said.

Bottas's fastest lap was set on much older tyres (and not on the fastest tyre available) than in 2004 as they did shorter stints. Race pace was also faster because the cars start the race with 105kg of fuel, double what they used to carry. Today they they are doing longer stints in fuel-heavier* cars.

Note, the cars are also much heavier than in 2004 as well, however as this is a fundamental property of the 'car' it's should not be factored into the performance differential. As a consequence of having that extra weight they get goodies like HERS, KERS and DRS.

Race pace is also far more controlled, by teams only going as fast as they have to because the engines have to last for 7-8 races. Again, I'm not going to count the reduced performance from having a longer life engine as a property against it, but it will affect how much the drivers will push, thus increasing the race time. Ie, the car could go faster, but when it's not worth risking engine life they won't do it.

I think the cars now are broadly equivalent in performance to the cars from 2004, but if there was a one race season (ie, not worrying about car wear), with brand new cars from both eras, today's cars would win every time.

Sure, but if it's all just potential it's worthless to us as viewers. The fact is that in 2004/5 races were run quicker (admittedly a small sample) so while the cars may be engineering miracles they haven't made any steps that translate to extra performance on track. And the other factor of course is if they had allowed natural evolution instead of forcing a particular path then how much quicker would the cars be? I'd suggest a damn sight quicker than they are now, in races and qualifying.

It is what it is and I'm not naive enough to think I'll change anything but the point I was making is that the claim the cars today are quicker than at any point in the past doesn't really translate to what we see for ourselves. Qualifying aside, races now are objectively slower than they were nearly 15 years ago. Which means the cars in their current state are also slower.

I agree with your point about the perception being that they are not much faster, however I want to clarify that I was quite deliberate not to mention how clever the engineering was in the current cars.

If they ran a 2004/5 car today, they would run it slower, strategy has evolved so much that they know much better when they don't need to push. However - conversely - I think it should also be pointed out that if people aren't knowing enough to know the details of the technology, then they also won't be informed enough to be comparing race duration times, and even if they did and saw they were 1 minute slower over a 2 hours race, I think most people wouldn't think that was particularly significant. Broadly speaking, people know to book out 90 minutes to 2 hours to watch an F1 race in the afternoon - even in 2009 after the aero regs got much stricter, it didn't bump the race times up by any meaningful amount.

Yes I take your point about strategy evolution, but I think that's exacerbated by the fact that today's cars have to conserve everything because they have to make them last multiple races, while in 2004/5 that wasn't the case. So there was no need for them to try to run things slower and they could just go out and have fun.

So with that in mind, I'm not sure I'd agree that if you were to run a 2004/5 car today (as a kind of late entrant!), but letting the 2004/5 car run to the same regs and tyres etc as in its day, it would be beaten be today's cars. Today strategy has taken a much more prominent role because of the saving mentality already mentioned, but in 2004/5 they had much freer reign to push. Which brings me back to my question on whether all the developments of the last 15 years have actually brought any progress, given that the cars are slower than they used to be (by virtue of having to be held back, maybe), but the costs have risen through the roof. I know this ship has sailed but personally I'd rather them have throwaway engines and gearboxes they could replace every race than ones which cost ten times as much but which they had to nurse every weekend.

I think that if they were allowed 8 engines a year, then the hybrids would seriously demolish the 2004 cars. At the moment if one of the 3 engines goes after one race, you have to do 50% more mileage on each remaining engine, so are pretty much guaranteed a penalty. If one out of 8 engines dies after one race, that just means that a couple of engines have to do an extra race, but as they will be designed for three races and a lot will be doing two, won't add anything more.

So at the moment, they are being really really careful with the current engines[. If they could turn the wick up, and design them to that specification, we'd be seeing some really special lap times. And given how Honda was throwing away engines, I don't think it's necessarily going to be that expensive for the engine manufacturers. As you scale production, the costs drop per unit, and I think there was an element of waste reduction going on - it wasn't a good look for a sport that already has an image problem with its environmental impact to be throwing away multiple engines every weekend.

Anyway, i agree it would be far more spectacular, and interesting to see the comparison between today and 2004 if the engines were more disposable.

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote: Bottas's fastest lap was set on much older tyres (and not on the fastest tyre available) than in 2004 as they did shorter stints. Race pace was also faster because the cars start the race with 105kg of fuel, double what they used to carry. Today they they are doing longer stints in fuel-heavier* cars.

Note, the cars are also much heavier than in 2004 as well, however as this is a fundamental property of the 'car' it's should not be factored into the performance differential. As a consequence of having that extra weight they get goodies like HERS, KERS and DRS.

Race pace is also far more controlled, by teams only going as fast as they have to because the engines have to last for 7-8 races. Again, I'm not going to count the reduced performance from having a longer life engine as a property against it, but it will affect how much the drivers will push, thus increasing the race time. Ie, the car could go faster, but when it's not worth risking engine life they won't do it.

I think the cars now are broadly equivalent in performance to the cars from 2004, but if there was a one race season (ie, not worrying about car wear), with brand new cars from both eras, today's cars would win every time.

Sure, but if it's all just potential it's worthless to us as viewers. The fact is that in 2004/5 races were run quicker (admittedly a small sample) so while the cars may be engineering miracles they haven't made any steps that translate to extra performance on track. And the other factor of course is if they had allowed natural evolution instead of forcing a particular path then how much quicker would the cars be? I'd suggest a damn sight quicker than they are now, in races and qualifying.

It is what it is and I'm not naive enough to think I'll change anything but the point I was making is that the claim the cars today are quicker than at any point in the past doesn't really translate to what we see for ourselves. Qualifying aside, races now are objectively slower than they were nearly 15 years ago. Which means the cars in their current state are also slower.

I agree with your point about the perception being that they are not much faster, however I want to clarify that I was quite deliberate not to mention how clever the engineering was in the current cars.

If they ran a 2004/5 car today, they would run it slower, strategy has evolved so much that they know much better when they don't need to push. However - conversely - I think it should also be pointed out that if people aren't knowing enough to know the details of the technology, then they also won't be informed enough to be comparing race duration times, and even if they did and saw they were 1 minute slower over a 2 hours race, I think most people wouldn't think that was particularly significant. Broadly speaking, people know to book out 90 minutes to 2 hours to watch an F1 race in the afternoon - even in 2009 after the aero regs got much stricter, it didn't bump the race times up by any meaningful amount.

Yes I take your point about strategy evolution, but I think that's exacerbated by the fact that today's cars have to conserve everything because they have to make them last multiple races, while in 2004/5 that wasn't the case. So there was no need for them to try to run things slower and they could just go out and have fun.

So with that in mind, I'm not sure I'd agree that if you were to run a 2004/5 car today (as a kind of late entrant!), but letting the 2004/5 car run to the same regs and tyres etc as in its day, it would be beaten be today's cars. Today strategy has taken a much more prominent role because of the saving mentality already mentioned, but in 2004/5 they had much freer reign to push. Which brings me back to my question on whether all the developments of the last 15 years have actually brought any progress, given that the cars are slower than they used to be (by virtue of having to be held back, maybe), but the costs have risen through the roof. I know this ship has sailed but personally I'd rather them have throwaway engines and gearboxes they could replace every race than ones which cost ten times as much but which they had to nurse every weekend.

I think that if they were allowed 8 engines a year, then the hybrids would seriously demolish the 2004 cars. At the moment if one of the 3 engines goes after one race, you have to do 50% more mileage on each remaining engine, so are pretty much guaranteed a penalty. If one out of 8 engines dies after one race, that just means that a couple of engines have to do an extra race, but as they will be designed for three races and a lot will be doing two, won't add anything more.

So at the moment, they are being really really careful with the current engines[. If they could turn the wick up, and design them to that specification, we'd be seeing some really special lap times. And given how Honda was throwing away engines, I don't think it's necessarily going to be that expensive for the engine manufacturers. As you scale production, the costs drop per unit, and I think there was an element of waste reduction going on - it wasn't a good look for a sport that already has an image problem with its environmental impact to be throwing away multiple engines every weekend.

Anyway, i agree it would be far more spectacular, and interesting to see the comparison between today and 2004 if the engines were more disposable.

I think we're in broad agreement, really.

Yes, if today's cars (and tyres!) didn't have to conserve then they would likely be significantly faster. But that's part of the point, really. Everyone's spent a lot of money to get to the stage where they could theoretically go faster but can't as then they would break down. And as a result the racing itself has suffered (IMO) because drivers can no longer push to the max as much as they used to. I'm not convinced that's progress. I do take your point about environmental impact but I think rebuilds could answer that to a degree. The bottom line is take away all the coulda/woulda/shouldas and your left with cars that complete a grand prix in slower times than they did 15 years ago, despite the billions that have been invested in the sport since.

Exediron wrote:

pokerman wrote:

wolfticket wrote:

Exediron wrote:

Tassadar wrote:I do miss the old V10 loud engines, and the really fast cars, but I understand why the changes happened.

There have never been faster cars than the current ones, so I'm not sure what you mean by this.

It's actually worth switching between footage of your fondest remembered period of F1 and the current cars if you can. You can complain about the noise if you want, but they are absolute rocket ships.

How can they be rocket ships when the lap times are not quicker?

They are quicker. Taken as a whole generation, the 2017-present cars are the quickest ever, with 2019 looking likely to set new records at every track where it doesn't rain. They are far quicker than any previous generation, even the mid-2000s V10 cars that were originally brought up.

I totally misread the post.

Tassadar wrote:

Exediron wrote:

Tassadar wrote:I do miss the old V10 loud engines, and the really fast cars, but I understand why the changes happened.

There have never been faster cars than the current ones, so I'm not sure what you mean by this.

That's a fair point, but this a very recent development. I must recant that point, you are correct.

Although, it must be pointed out that the modern cars are only now catching up to the 2004 cars, which shows you just how beastly they were (of course, this is all to do with the rule changes). Imagine cars now with rules more like the mid-2000's. My word.

Well the thread starter is referring to 2019 and they've not caught up I believe they have surpassed the 2004 cars?

Zoue wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Zoue wrote:Sure, but if it's all just potential it's worthless to us as viewers. The fact is that in 2004/5 races were run quicker (admittedly a small sample) so while the cars may be engineering miracles they haven't made any steps that translate to extra performance on track. And the other factor of course is if they had allowed natural evolution instead of forcing a particular path then how much quicker would the cars be? I'd suggest a damn sight quicker than they are now, in races and qualifying.

It is what it is and I'm not naive enough to think I'll change anything but the point I was making is that the claim the cars today are quicker than at any point in the past doesn't really translate to what we see for ourselves. Qualifying aside, races now are objectively slower than they were nearly 15 years ago. Which means the cars in their current state are also slower.

I agree with your point about the perception being that they are not much faster, however I want to clarify that I was quite deliberate not to mention how clever the engineering was in the current cars.

If they ran a 2004/5 car today, they would run it slower, strategy has evolved so much that they know much better when they don't need to push. However - conversely - I think it should also be pointed out that if people aren't knowing enough to know the details of the technology, then they also won't be informed enough to be comparing race duration times, and even if they did and saw they were 1 minute slower over a 2 hours race, I think most people wouldn't think that was particularly significant. Broadly speaking, people know to book out 90 minutes to 2 hours to watch an F1 race in the afternoon - even in 2009 after the aero regs got much stricter, it didn't bump the race times up by any meaningful amount.

Yes I take your point about strategy evolution, but I think that's exacerbated by the fact that today's cars have to conserve everything because they have to make them last multiple races, while in 2004/5 that wasn't the case. So there was no need for them to try to run things slower and they could just go out and have fun.

So with that in mind, I'm not sure I'd agree that if you were to run a 2004/5 car today (as a kind of late entrant!), but letting the 2004/5 car run to the same regs and tyres etc as in its day, it would be beaten be today's cars. Today strategy has taken a much more prominent role because of the saving mentality already mentioned, but in 2004/5 they had much freer reign to push. Which brings me back to my question on whether all the developments of the last 15 years have actually brought any progress, given that the cars are slower than they used to be (by virtue of having to be held back, maybe), but the costs have risen through the roof. I know this ship has sailed but personally I'd rather them have throwaway engines and gearboxes they could replace every race than ones which cost ten times as much but which they had to nurse every weekend.

I think that if they were allowed 8 engines a year, then the hybrids would seriously demolish the 2004 cars. At the moment if one of the 3 engines goes after one race, you have to do 50% more mileage on each remaining engine, so are pretty much guaranteed a penalty. If one out of 8 engines dies after one race, that just means that a couple of engines have to do an extra race, but as they will be designed for three races and a lot will be doing two, won't add anything more.

So at the moment, they are being really really careful with the current engines[. If they could turn the wick up, and design them to that specification, we'd be seeing some really special lap times. And given how Honda was throwing away engines, I don't think it's necessarily going to be that expensive for the engine manufacturers. As you scale production, the costs drop per unit, and I think there was an element of waste reduction going on - it wasn't a good look for a sport that already has an image problem with its environmental impact to be throwing away multiple engines every weekend.

Anyway, i agree it would be far more spectacular, and interesting to see the comparison between today and 2004 if the engines were more disposable.

I think we're in broad agreement, really.

Yes, if today's cars (and tyres!) didn't have to conserve then they would likely be significantly faster. But that's part of the point, really. Everyone's spent a lot of money to get to the stage where they could theoretically go faster but can't as then they would break down. And as a result the racing itself has suffered (IMO) because drivers can no longer push to the max as much as they used to. I'm not convinced that's progress. I do take your point about environmental impact but I think rebuilds could answer that to a degree. The bottom line is take away all the coulda/woulda/shouldas and your left with cars that complete a grand prix in slower times than they did 15 years ago, despite the billions that have been invested in the sport since.

Really interesting dialog between you two. I feel like F1 has lost track of its identity because of pressure to be more environmentally minded. While I still think it's the pinnacle of automotive engineering, the focus has shifted slightly from speed to endurance. The current engine regs introduced so many possible points of failure, and with such a limited supply of engines before massive penalties, teams and drivers have no choice but to baby the cars. The goal of reducing cost and waste by limiting PU allotments any reducing on-track testing doesn't seem to have worked anyway. While waste may not be taking place on track, it's certainly happening back in factories. I heard one commentator or journalist last year say that engine suppliers are going through more engines because of the regulations.

You also hear people talk about road relevance when defending the current regulations, but that's a long and slow trickle-down. The road cars that are benefiting most directly from the engineering in current F1 are over $1M. How can that be called "road relevance"?

Why do people want races to end faster? I like getting as much race time as I can

mcdo wrote:Why do people want races to end faster? I like getting as much race time as I can

Indeed.

pokerman wrote:

mcdo wrote:Why do people want races to end faster? I like getting as much race time as I can

Indeed.

It's what it represents. The cars are pacing themselves now and only rarely really push in comparison to pre-conservation days

Is F1 still boring after the Bahrain race?

Exediron wrote:

Tassadar wrote:I do miss the old V10 loud engines, and the really fast cars, but I understand why the changes happened.

There have never been faster cars than the current ones, so I'm not sure what you mean by this.

Today’s car’s are faster overall, but the v10 and v12 cars were quicker in technical sections of tracks.
Go back and watch old races to see what I’m talking about. Silverstone, Spa, Magny, and others. The biggest differentiator the current engine formula provides is instant power exiting slower sections compared to the v10 and v12 which would have to build revs to get up to speed.

But a v10 or v12 designed today would surprise many doubters. People
Lose sight of the fact it’s been well over 10 years since F1 featured v10’s and those engines were rev limited as were their successors, and thenv8’s could run reliably upwards of 20k RPM, so imagine what v10’s and v12’s could do.

ptr250 wrote:There is not much racing going on in F1. Instead of 1st & 2nd separated by a few tenths of seconds, Bottas had almost a half minute cushion. He could of stopped in the pits and had a brew and still won! There wasn't much going on in the mid-field either. As it is, the best passing takes place in the pits! Indy may not have the sophisticated cars that are in F1 and world's best drivers, but the racing is far more exciting.

Another weekend and.. that was boring wasn't it.

Very predictable.

Merc walked away with an easy 1-2.

No reliability issues by the field. No mistakes. After the first lap I bet people thought Ferrari 1-2 with Bottas 3rd and Lewis dropping down the field.

I love this boring F1 stuff.

Those who still feel F1 is boring need to wait for China & if it rains, it's going to be a great race. Even without rain, China produces great racing. INfact, the race after that (Baku) is as enthralling!

F1 MERCENARY wrote:

Exediron wrote:

Tassadar wrote:I do miss the old V10 loud engines, and the really fast cars, but I understand why the changes happened.

There have never been faster cars than the current ones, so I'm not sure what you mean by this.

Today’s car’s are faster overall, but the v10 and v12 cars were quicker in technical sections of tracks.
Go back and watch old races to see what I’m talking about. Silverstone, Spa, Magny, and others. The biggest differentiator the current engine formula provides is instant power exiting slower sections compared to the v10 and v12 which would have to build revs to get up to speed.

But a v10 or v12 designed today would surprise many doubters. People
Lose sight of the fact it’s been well over 10 years since F1 featured v10’s and those engines were rev limited as were their successors, and thenv8’s could run reliably upwards of 20k RPM, so imagine what v10’s and v12’s could do.

The power of the present engines is being limited as well.