Ferrari & McLaren compared on medium tires and similar fuel

[firbanks]

I put together a quick analysis of the lap times of Alonso's Ferrari and Hamilton's McLaren on the medium tires.


The figure shows lap times from Alonso and Hamilton following their pit stops on lap 16 and 15 respectively (outlaps have been excluded). Both ran largely unimpeded with only a few exceptions. Alonso closed the gap to Vettel on lap 30 but did not pass until lap 34 (marked as ‘1’ on the figure). This occurred shortly after Vettel’s engine problem developed. In between these laps you can see how Alonso’s lap times dropped off as he was held up and forced to move around to keep his car cool. Hamilton, in comparison, caught Vettel after his engine problem, and thus was only slightly delayed on lap 37 (marked as ‘2’ on the figure) prior to passing him on lap 38. Hamilton was also briefly held up behind Liuzzi on lap 18 just prior to Liuzzi pitting.

From the two trend lines we can see that the McLaren was initially faster than the Ferrari by a few tenths following pit stops. This gap slowly closed over the next 13 laps until the Ferrari began to produce faster lap times. By the end of the race, the Ferrari was roughly 1.2 seconds faster than the McLaren. This performance differential may be tempered in part by the two drivers letting off to save the engine for the last few laps, but the relationship between the two curves remains similar.

[segedunum]

Interesting stuff.

The widely held belief is that the McLaren conserved its tyres better during the race (perhaps because some people were expecting worse), but this gives lie to that when you actually compare it relative to a competitor. The drop-off in performance of the McLaren is really quite marked whereas Ferrari's drops of much more gradually. There is a much bigger window of time where Ferrari are faster.

I had no idea the lap times had gone off that much with the McLaren. I just wonder what will happen when they get some decent levels of downforce on the car, get to tracks with more cornering characteristics and start working their tyres harder. They aren't competing with Ferrari any time soon on that evidence.

[marcush.]

Interesting stuff.

The widely held belief is that the McLaren conserved its tyres better during the race (perhaps because some people were expecting worse), but this gives lie to that when you actually compare it relative to a competitor. The drop-off in performance of the McLaren is really quite marked whereas Ferrari's drops of much more gradually. There is a much bigger window of time where Ferrari are faster.

I had no idea the lap times had gone off that much with the McLaren. I just wonder what will happen when they get some decent levels of downforce on the car, get to tracks with more cornering characteristics and start working their tyres harder. They aren't competing with Ferrari any time soon on that evidence.

wyou could not say that more downforce is equal to abusing the tyres more.It could as well be that having not enough downforce is making you sliding and abusing the tyres...or not?
So adding downforce could in my view help their tyre degradation.

[segedunum]

wyou could not say that more downforce is equal to abusing the tyres more.It could as well be that having not enough downforce is making you sliding and abusing the tyres...or not? So adding downforce could in my view help their tyre degradation.

Yep, that's certainly true. They'd certainly like to add some aerodynamic grip rather than the mechanical grip they seemingly tried to go with by stiffening their suspension. I'm still puzzled why they seemed to do that because it should have been obvious to them. However, with more grip and cornering speed you're still working the tyres harder whatever you do. It's not free. It'll be a few races I think before we really see what's going on there.

[Richard]

Nice to see some hard data, thanks.

I think the analysis has validity up to lap 37, after then the times rather yo yo with drivers putting in blocks of fast times followed by blocks of slow times. I recall a moment when we heard a message on Hamilton's radio telling him to slow down, I wonder if that was around lap 35?

The trend curve hides the fact that Hamilton a 3 lap burst in laps 42, 43, 44 that matched Alonso's fastest block.

The other thing that stands out are Alonso's super fast times on laps 36 and 45. Are they correct?

My conclusion is that Hamilton was able to match Alonso for the first 35 laps. Also that the Alonso was able to demonstrate sustained fast times rather than Hamilton's short burst.

Edit to add a graphic showing my thoughts:

[fausto cedros]

To me, it seems that Alonso's Ferrari becomes a little faster as the fuel unloads. This could be well due to the harder mechanical setup. I guess that the harder choice was due in the attempt not to variate the ride height of the car that much during the race but they had to lighten the downforce, because they supposed the tyres wouldn't reasonably have stood that. But they missed the real tyre performance troughout the race, and the fact that the middle section really seemed to be a piece of interlagos in the Gulf. After all, the lack of pace in the end is similar to the one in qualifying and that's due to the setup choice. Macca is there, to me, and i'd rather be worried after australia, in case. At the moment, Red Bull is the real asset to me. Don't forget that it seems that ferrari engines suffered the weekend very badly. And it's no good.

[doopie2you]

I put together a quick analysis of the lap times of Alonso's Ferrari and Hamilton's McLaren on the medium tires.


The figure shows lap times from Alonso and Hamilton following their pit stops on lap 16 and 15 respectively (outlaps have been excluded). Both ran largely unimpeded with only a few exceptions. Alonso closed the gap to Vettel on lap 30 but did not pass until lap 34 (marked as ‘1’ on the figure). This occurred shortly after Vettel’s engine problem developed. In between these laps you can see how Alonso’s lap times dropped off as he was held up and forced to move around to keep his car cool. Hamilton, in comparison, caught Vettel after his engine problem, and thus was only slightly delayed on lap 37 (marked as ‘2’ on the figure) prior to passing him on lap 38. Hamilton was also briefly held up behind Liuzzi on lap 18 just prior to Liuzzi pitting.

From the two trend lines we can see that the McLaren was initially faster than the Ferrari by a few tenths following pit stops. This gap slowly closed over the next 13 laps until the Ferrari began to produce faster lap times. By the end of the race, the Ferrari was roughly 1.2 seconds faster than the McLaren. This performance differential may be tempered in part by the two drivers letting off to save the engine for the last few laps, but the relationship between the two curves remains similar.

Where did you find all the times that they have ran every lap? I would see them too.

[zoic]

http://fialive.fiacommunications.com/en ... iming.aspx

[Rob W]

Thanks for doing the chart firbanks.

I don't know whether everyone will agree on the conclusions but it's certainly good to see a side-by-side comparison like that.

I wonder what another team such as Williams or whoever would look like - assuming we can find someone who also had a largely unimpeded run for that portion of the race.

Rosberg maybe?

[myurr]

Nice to see some hard data, thanks.

I think the analysis has validity up to lap 37, after then the times rather yo yo with drivers putting in blocks of fast times followed by blocks of slow times. I recall a moment when we heard a message on Hamilton's radio telling him to slow down, I wonder if that was around lap 35?

The trend curve hides the fact that Hamilton a 3 lap burst in laps 42, 43, 44 that matched Alonso's fastest block.

The other thing that stands out are Alonso's super fast times on laps 36 and 45. Are they correct?

My conclusion is that Hamilton was able to match Alonso for the first 35 laps. Also that the Alonso was able to demonstrate sustained fast times rather than Hamilton's short burst.

Edit to add a graphic showing my thoughts:

Totally agree with your analysis - Alonso's Ferrari is clearly quicker over the stint as a whole, but the McLaren isn't in bad shape. Would be interesting to see the comparison with Red Bull up to their mechanical issues.

[elsab]

The comparison is great, however...
I don't think that it is fair to say that both of these drivers were doing comparable unimpeded stints.

Hamilton pushed his tyres much harder in his outlap (not shown in the graph) and in his first full lap of the run to ensure that he overtook Rosberg. This will undoubtably have effected the tyres for the rest of the stint.

[Richard]

Hamilton pushed his tyres much harder in his outlap (not shown in the graph) and in his first full lap of the run to ensure that he overtook Rosberg. This will undoubtably have effected the tyres for the rest of the stint.

I'm not convinced a couple of laps would make such a long lasting difference, compared to a total of 35-ish laps?

[firbanks]

Hi all, thanks for the feedback.

Richard_leeds: I agree with you 100% that the data is more difficult to draw conclusions from following ~lap 37. I suppose only the drivers and teams could really say how hard the cars were pushing near the end. Alonso's fast laps are correct (he did the 1:58.287 on lap 45).

I took a quick look at Rosberg and Schumacher for a similar period of time (i.e. after the switch to medium tires). Both ran relatively unimpeded following their pit stops. Hamilton pulled away from Rosberg, and Schu was always a few seconds back from his teammate. Rosberg only slows up near the end when he catches, but can not get past Vettel (marked '1' on the figure).



The most interesting thing here is that there is no drop in lap time near the end for the Mercedes drivers. This very likely indicates that that Hamilton and Alonso were letting up for the last few laps. Alternatively (and this is highly speculative) the Mercedes is incredibly kind to its tires relative to the McLaren and the Ferrari. I lean towards the first conclusion, as both Rosberg and Schumacher had been given the hurry up to catch Vettel.

I should have mentioned this in the first post, but here is a link to all of the data: http://www.fia.com/en-GB/mediacentre/f1 ... iming.aspx

[firbanks]

Here is the Alonso - Hamilton Comparison up to lap 37. Also, four data points were removed from Alonso's lap times (laps 31-34, when he was held up behind Vettel), and two from Hamilton's (lap 18, behind Liuzzi, and lap 37, when he was held up behind Vettel).

*Updated to include Vettel's laps up until 32 (around the time the problem developed).



The relationship between the McLaren and Ferrari curves is similar to the first figure with all of the data, but the difference between the cars by lap 37 is less pronounced than before - somewhere around five tenths. Also notice Hamilton's quick time on lap 17 (2nd after pit). Vettel is a bit slower than both. I wouldn't read too much into the trend line extrapolation beyond his lap 32.

Again, this is not a perfect comparison, but the fueling rules for this year allow for much better comparisons than previous years did.

[Rob W]

firbanks, your last graph highlights a point which is salient here.

Vettel was in front of Alonso and pulling away for a large chunk of the race. But the graph shows him to be slower that entire time. He wasn't really doing consistently slower laps from laps 17 to 32 approx was he? (Or did he do all his driving off pre pit-stop?)

Maybe the graph would show relative pace more accurately if it ignored laps where drivers encounter significant traffic (lap 27 for example) or other hindrances.

If the idea is to get an idea of the race pace then only 'free' laps should be considered. Anything else just skews the curve.