Formula 1 CFA Comments
Hungarian GP 2013 - Preview
by Cato Batista, 25/07/2013 23:22:14
Ladies and Gentlemen,
The long 3-week wait is over, the F1s are back in action for the 10th round of the Championship this weekend in Hungary, and let’s enjoy it in full because after this race the Circus will enter its summer holidays for an enforced 4-week non-activity period.
We might don’t like it but Grand Prix racing these days is mostly about Pirelli. Tyre issues had become more relevant than engines, cars or drivers, unfortunately. So let’s get on with it: the rubber for this race will be medium/white and soft/yellow. These are the compounds tried without problems is last week’s Young Driver Test , but the interesting development is that the weather forecast for the weekend is expected in the 40 deg C making it possibly the hottest GP ever.
F1 is no stranger to racing in hot conditions, the Malaysian GP is traditionally the toughest physical challenge of the season because its high humidity, but in general the events are planned to avoid taking place at the peak temperatures of each particular venue. If air temperature climbs above 40c on race day the challenge will be not only for the drivers but also the tyres at the demanding Hungaroring Circuit.
With the slower lap times in the calendar except for Monaco, the best high downforce chassis of Red Bull and Mercedes are expected to do well in here, the question will be how much ground Mercedes has lost by being excluded from last week’s test. The Silver Arrows had been the fastest QF cars so far this season with 6 of the ...
German GP 2013 - Carlos wins and joins the chase
by Cato Batista, 07/07/2013 22:41:38
Ladies and Gentlemen,
A hard earned victory by Vettel with the Lotus drivers chasing him relentlessly. Alonso was not far behind but there was no sight of the Mercedes joining the flat-out battle at the front. Another race marked by the tyres and the strategy -on how to handle them- with Red Bull prevailing in the end. No matter what compound, temperature or kind of track, Red Bull is the dominant force in F1 and Vettel keeps marching confidently to his 4th straight title.
Emphatic victory by Carlos with 11 points by a 3 point margin over Tim, Uwe, Santi, Manbos and I; his 3 triples made him the 8th different winner this season. Our average score was a lowly six and a quarter points as we continue to make this the most competitive (and difficult) year in the CFA record books.
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German GP 2013 - QF
by Cato Batista, 05/07/2013 23:34:51
Ladies and Gentlemen,
There are new tyres but not much else has changed. The Mercedes are flying chased very closely by the Red Bulls.
In P1 the Silver Arrows were a second faster than everybody else; in P2, when we saw the teams’ QF simulation runs it was Vettel on top but even then the Championship leader concedes Mercedes looks hard to beat for the pole. Lotus is showing good form, perhaps benefited by the low temperatures that are expected for the entire weekend (low 8 to high 15 deg C). Alonso’s Ferrari had a double electrical glitch on P1 that prevented him from completing a single lap. The red cars are showing progress after their Silverstone disappointment finishing 0.6 secs behind the lead in P2. Button’s McLaren was faster than the Force India and Toro Rosso for the first time for quite a while.
P1 – HAM (1.31.754) ROS WEB SUT RAI MAS BUT VET GRO PER
P2 – VET (1.30.416) ROS WEB GRO RAI ALO MAS HAM BUT
The most revealing fact from today’s session was how soon the prime tyres (yellow-soft) are losing their grip, in as little as 4 or 5 laps!, in contrast to the option (medium-white) that apparently can go on and on with no drop in performance. This new batch introduced by Pirelli has the old style Kevlar belt instead of steel and clearly Mercedes and Red Bull had no problem quickly adapting to them. As we know Friday’s sessions provide the best ...
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German GP 2013 - Preview
by Cato Batista, 05/07/2013 0:01:01
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Business as usual: it’s all about the tyres. But this time is serious, it was actually dangerous.
Pirelli blames the teams for mounting their tyres the wrong way around and using insufficient pressure (they’ll do anything to improve lap times) Teams are blaming each other (Red Bull’s Adrian Newey accusing Ferrari-Force India-Lotus) for not allowing Pirelli to supply the new construction design that was going to be introduced by Canada since they were afraid to lose their competitive edge. Stronger construction tyres will be used this weekend, and after that there’s talk of reverting to the 2012 tyres with the 2013 compounds. FIA has agreed to change the strict testing rules –first time this happens since introduced in 2009- to allow the teams’ race drivers to participate in the ‘Young Drivers Test’ scheduled for 17-19 July. How ironic that Mercedes was banned as a consequence for the "Pirelli-Barcelona fiasco" which was considered a very light punishment for the size of the offence and now will be left out of this testing sessions so critical to understand the tyres that will be used for the rest of the season.
After 8 races the balance looks like this: VET three wins, ALO & ROS two each, RAI one. That is 4 drivers and 4 different teams. Mercedes has been on pole 5 times and has locked the front row 3 times.
Our CFA winners so far: Lou (2); Maria, Uwe, Manbos, Erik, Rodrigo, Rocco, one each. Joe has the highest Race points ...
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