Adrian Newey on quitting F1

[GitanesBlondes]

Motor Sport has an article on their website about it that can be read here...

http://www.motorsportmagazine.com/f1/ad ... itting-f1/

I must say, my fellow F1 technical directors have been like turkeys voting for Christmas.

Sad times.

Newey will now join John Barnard, Gordon Murray, and Gerard Ducarouge outside of F1.

The fans keep begging for closer racing with no regard for what it helps to create. It's the quickest way to ensure that the technical regulations force everyone into a funnel where there is little creativity to be had. Forced socialism. Awesome.

[bhall II]

Despite Newey's implication to the contrary, I don't think there's anything wrong with F1 being "an engine formula." It's certainly no worse than its former status as an "aero formula" over the last few years. Ideally, though, it should be a formula with room to maneuver on all fronts, but I fear that aspect of the sport is dead and gone.

[xpensive]

Mixed emotions, that's all I can say. He's of course right about F1 is going GP1, but I don't like his aero-formula either.

The engine-formula he mentions is totally down to the ambition to turn F1 into quasi-endurance with complex Hybrid tecnology.

Get rid of that and open up the regulations for 3.0 atmos, with fuel limitation if you wish.

[GitanesBlondes]

Despite Newey's implication to the contrary, I don't think there's anything wrong with F1 being "an engine formula." It's certainly no worse than its former status as an "aero formula" over the last few years. Ideally, though, it should be a formula with room to maneuver on all fronts, but I fear that aspect of the sport is dead and gone.

I agree, labeling it as such is a misnomer as it's anything but in any real sense of the word.

Giving the teams as much input as they have had on the technical side has been a colossal mistake. There's nothing wrong with seeking input, but allowing them to dictate the direction of where things have gone was a horrific idea. Not that the FIA has been any better on this front mind you, but there's a general lack of any rational thought processing on the part of both sides. Just self-serving agendas jockeying for supreme position.

[GitanesBlondes]

Mixed emotions, that's all I can say. He's of course right about F1 is going GP1, but I don't like his aero-formula either.

The engine-formula he mentions is totally down to the ambition to turn F1 into quasi-endurance with complex Hybrid tecnology.

Get rid of that and open up the regulations for 3.0 atmos, with fuel limitation if you wish.

F1 should have been striving to find a balance between the engine side and the aero-side, but we were given Formula Aero for the last 6 seasons including this one because of the belief that allowing for exploration of engine design was somehow a bad thing. I'm not even sure where the idea came from that restricting that would be attractive to engine manufacturers at large. Even though it was, and remains ill-informed, I can understand where the rationale to limit engines and some development would come from. But this "quasi-endurance" aspect that you mention is bizarre as the WEC should have fulfilled the FIA's needs for "road relevancy" and widespread manufacturer participation.

Why 3.0L for the engines? Just curious.

[xpensive]

...
Why 3.0L for the engines? Just curious.

Because it's a nice historical number and the resulting 850 Hp would be appropriate for the top racing formula.

[SectorOne]

As a fan of wheel to wheel battles it seems to me an engine formula is much better placed at providing that. (and i have no idea why, it just seems to work)
I do however agree with Bhall a bit in that F1 is sick at the moment, but i don´t think that´s down to the powerunits, instead more in rules and regulations and how the sport is run.

Newey as much as i love his cars that look like something evolution has perfected over millions of years it´s easy to understand how a hardcore aero guy is pissed when he can´t design his way out of a hole like in previous years.

I do however see that it´s not just about aero vs engine for him since let´s face it, since 2009 more or less every single rule change has been to stop Newey in his tracks because he did a job that put simply was superior to everyone else bar maybe the MP4-27 (which i´m positive was a fluke since Mclaren did not even understand it, they just got it right that time)

[Shrieker]

"You have 70 liters of fuel to work with. Bring in any engine you want."

I see nothing wrong with that. We'd not have had to suffer the sorry sound either. Even my dad (who doesn't give a s***) complained about the sound this last race... So yes, nothing wrong with F1 becoming too engine oriented - if there ever is such a thing.

[xpensive]

140 liters and you have a winner as long as you ditch the quasi-endurance gizmos, there's WSC for such things. =D>

[Aesto]

In a formula in which aero development is free and engines are restricted, the show is bound to suffer because of the dirty air effect. This leads to the introduction of crap like DRS. By contrast, a formula in which engine development is free and aero is not is simply no longer economically viable. Engine development is simply too expensive in a time in which teams can't spend as freely as they used to. A formula in which both aero and engine development is unrestricted is ultimately just an aero formula because aero is stronger. Plus, it'd be the most expensive of all.

Hence, we have arrived in a situation in which both aero and engine are restricted. Obviously, this sucks, but I just don't see a valid alternative. Of course there can always be improvements to the formula, but in the end it's an unsolvable dilemma. There is no good solution. It's tragic that this has caused F1 to lose a brilliant mind such as Newey's. But that's just the way it is.

Ultimately, it's still the team that has managed to assemble the largest amount of collective intelligence in its engineering team that wins the championship every year. This is how F1 has worked since the beginning, and as long as that continues to be the case, I for one will keep watching.

[Ali F1]

Newey is a racer through and through, no matter how much satisfaction he gets from designing fast cars. Even if RB were leading the 2014 constructors' championship, I still think he'd be unhappy with F1.

The 2014 cars simply do not assault a spectator's senses like the previous eras of Formula 1 cars did. Although the actual racing is sublime, the gritty racing atmosphere is gone, and that is what I think has made him leave.

[Lycoming]

Wonder what he'll move onto. Something interesting, no doubt. I hope he doesn't go into aerospace or defence and work on some project that takes 20 years of development before it sees the light of day, but I'd heard that he doesn't like that sort of thing anyways.

[langwadt]

"You have 70 liters of fuel to work with. Bring in any engine you want."

I see nothing wrong with that. We'd not have had to suffer the sorry sound either. Even my dad (who doesn't give a s***) complained about the sound this last race... So yes, nothing wrong with F1 becoming too engine oriented - if there ever is such a thing.

70liter is far too little, that is half of what they have now. What make you think that a formula only limited by fuel wouldn't be even quieter?

[Just_a_fan]

"You have 70 liters of fuel to work with. Bring in any engine you want."

I see nothing wrong with that. We'd not have had to suffer the sorry sound either.

They'd be quiet because they'd be doing what they're doing now - small capacity turbocharged engines. Because small turbocharged engines are more fuel efficient than noisy, big, naturally aspirated ones.

If you want big noisy engines you need to let them burn as much fuel as they want to carry. Let them decide where the fuel weight / performance balance is for their engine.

[Just_a_fan]

Wonder what he'll move onto. Something interesting, no doubt.

A few years ago I remember reading that he had an interest in designing a racing yacht or something similar. Whether he ever did anything about it at the time I don't know.