Post here all non technical related topics about Formula One. This includes race results, discussions, testing analysis etc. TV coverage and other personal questions should be in Off topic chat.
godlameroso wrote:Race pace with a full tank will be in the 25's and 24's, 23's if they're super duper fast, if you see a team hovering around there you know that's what they're focusing on and probably have an extra 5 seconds for qualifying. If you see them doing 22's 21's that means they're on ~ half a tank. Most aero tests, and system checks will be around race pace, perhaps a bit slower. The teams that have wildly fluctuating lap times are simply doing tests and checks. No one is going to go purposefully slow however, they may play around with fuel, ballast, run experimental parts and just gather data, but no one is going to sandbag in the traditional sense. We may not see any low fuel fuel time attack softest tire quali runs from the big teams, but no one is going out there to tread water, not with so many regulation changes. Someone will do an all out glory run, if it's above 1:20 we'll know who's not showing their pace.
so they will sand bag. especially RB, Merc. Expect your glory run as always from Williams.
Finishing races is important, but racing is more important.
Bringing this one back, apparently the Ferrari did laps in the 59's with a best lap in the 58's at Fiorano during the debut shakedown. I know it's not representative at all, but that's already matching 2010 lap times. I don't want to say I was right, because I'm probably wrong and they can go faster under better conditions. I'd say I was in the ballpark, 1:18's maybe high 17's at Barcelona at the limit, if they go faster I'll be seriously impressed, and a little worried.
Just to iterate the reference point, the all time fastest time on Barcelona circuit is a 1m14.648s from Alonso in 2006 GP.
The 2016 Spanish GP pole was a 1m22.000, set on Softs by Lewis. If that time is extrapolated for Ultra Softs, it would translate into a high 1m20.xxx. As we all know, teams lose 1 second in Barcelona from Winter Testing to Race due to weather change (high temperatures for race). So, that time would have translated into a high 1m19.xxx in 2016 winter testing.
If we see the usual teams that chase ultimate times, like Williams, Haas and Renault (let's forget Sauber as they would be using 2016 PU), I think they would do a 1m19.xxx on Ultra Softs, sometime in the second test. I expect the gap to widen between top teams and the mid fielders this year and with that, I expect 1m17.xxx as a possibility from top teams. But........ we will not see that time as most of them would try to understand long run performance of the new cars and new tyres.
Of all the teams, McLaren and Renault want to find out what their ultimate performance is. So, that would become the reference point. Both cars look massively developed from last year and with considerable enhancement on PU performance. So they would definitely like to explore their limits.
Yeah, it's some kind of WTF. The single available shortcut is passing a complex of 1-5 corners, but in real life it is crossed by a steel safety fence. Even with circular pre-last corner it's too fast.
This is the real time image of the circuit. I don't see any shortcut that can take away 24 seconds out of a Renault's last year's performance. Whoever was driving, went full speed and didn't looked like breaking any earlier than normal, to take the shortcut before turn 1.
Last edited by GPR-A duplicate2 on 25 Feb 2017, 18:16, edited 1 time in total.
As mentioned already, layout is not the same. However, if you put this renault side by side with the RB6 they're almost tied just before the newly installed chicane, with slight advantage to the renault. So this should give you some idea of how they compare.
The amount of exclamation marks in some posts above makes me really believe that Renault just smashed the lap record by some 10 seconds at the first roll out. No guys, they went for the short cut.
Edit: 1:00 min for a lap 4.655km long would be 279,3 kph in average. Sounds a bit unrealistic doesnt it?
They surely used the short cut before T1 and maybe didnt drive the chicane. Picture above doesnt even show the chicane
That's an old picture, GPR-A, this is what the final section looks like now.
They could have built a short cut in there, or maybe use parts of the old layout, but it is a mistery. And why would you short cut the circuit at all?
Last edited by hollus on 25 Feb 2017, 21:19, edited 2 times in total.
