Ferrari, where did that second go?

[Echo]

The season is not over, right? McLaren will have problem with their car when they are developing... Their car is just too complicated for development

[myurr]

The season is not over, right? McLaren will have problem with their car when they are developing... Their car is just too complicated for development

Sounds a bit wishful thinking there...

The gap in Australia from Alonso to Hamilton was 0.6 seconds. In Malaysia it's now 0.8 seconds, and McLaren know where more performance is to come from as they have not yet fully optimised their car.

Ferrari and Red Bull have just produced optimised versions of last years cars with far less scope for big improvements. They're going to be limited to fine tuning and tiny little optimisations.

[Echo]

The season is not over, right? McLaren will have problem with their car when they are developing... Their car is just too complicated for development

Sounds a bit wishful thinking there...

The gap in Australia from Alonso to Hamilton was 0.6 seconds. In Malaysia it's now 0.8 seconds, and McLaren know where more performance is to come from as they have not yet fully optimised their car.

Ferrari and Red Bull have just produced optimised versions of last years cars with far less scope for big improvements. They're going to be limited to fine tuning and tiny little optimisations.

Yes but in testing we have to consider that McLaren had huge problems with the car so their panic solution was an exhaust copy of RB, I think they must change it during developments and "whoops" the McLaren is unbalanced

[timbo]

Race pace seems to be quite good.
Not as good as RBR, but on par with Macca and better than Renault and others.

[myurr]

Race pace seems to be quite good.
Not as good as RBR, but on par with Macca and better than Renault and others.

Interestingly the track temperature dropped and that seemed to suit the Ferrari's and hurt Red Bull and McLaren to varying degrees.

[Echo]

Ya... Weird thou the Ferrari semed so balanced during the race.. Not as oversteery as in the quali...

[WhiteBlue]

I think Ferrari were not hiding anything but neither Mclaren nor RB were showing their hand in testing,that´s all.
Mclaren had in my view a good idea what they could do but gambled a bit on the more radical ideas in the hope to leapfrog RB which did not work out so they just stepped back to solid ground.
RedBull were quitely developping their car without the need to show their speed and put their their KERS development at the end of their programme.
Ferraris car is just too conservative to challenge for the front row

Exactly. And now, even before the second race, we face the boring prospect of a 2-make race for the season. The gap between RB/McL and "the rest" is at 1-1.5 seconds -- an eternity. Yes, it's very early, but Ferrari, Renault and M-B need to find well over a scond to be competitive (because RB and McL will continue to improve). Time to speculate about when Pat Fry moves up -- or someone else is brought in from the outside.

I have been saying for a year that Ferrari is going to drop out of the top team category as soon as the resource restrictions are hitting them fully. The present car was still designed with more resources than any other team could muster in 2010. Nevertheless they are 1 s behind the pace at the begin of the season.

My view is that Ferrari will have two choices very soon. They can throw all they have behind the F150 and neglect their 2012 car or they can address their inherent inefficiency and switch very early to the 2012 car. It will be interesting to see what they do. Whatever happens their biggest management issue is raising engineering efficiency. The only way to do this is to buy more top people away from other teams. So watch out for Ferrari on a shopping spree for Red Bull and McLaren talent.

[andrew]

I sincerely doubt it and respectfully disagree.

This is a top flight professional F1 team we are spaeking about, not a bunch of amatuers. Their main problem is going with a very conservative design. Ferrari could have 10 engineers or 200 engineers and they would in all probability be in the same position.

To suggest that any F1 team stops development of their current car after only 2 races and concentrate on the car for the following year is completely ludicrous. It was pretty obvious in the race that the Ferraris were not too far behind and it is qualifying where they screw-up.

[volarchico]

...To suggest that any F1 team stops development of their current car after only 2 races and concentrate on the car for the following year is completely ludicrous. ...

You are speaking about the same person who started the thread that Ferrari should focus on the 2012 after only ONE race.

[myurr]

Ya... Weird thou the Ferrari semed so balanced during the race.. Not as oversteery as in the quali...

And the complete opposite to practice where the balance was changing dramatically throughout a stint.

[sriraj1031]

Ya... Weird thou the Ferrari semed so balanced during the race.. Not as oversteery as in the quali...

But they were never close to doing the speeds that everyone did in quali, so i guess there problem lies when they have very less fuel load

[SiLo]

I think it all came down to tyres and management. To me, there is obviously a certain pace that the tyres can generally go at, and anything above that they just drop off really quick, so all the teams look to be off similar pace. I hope Ferrari do get up there quick though, and that Pirelli sort out the tyres so we can see some 6-way duels for pole and the race.

[andrew]

Looks like they are not giving up, as some predicted.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/90632

Clearly they are not listening to Briatore!

[Florio]

Race pace seems to be quite good.
Not as good as RBR, but on par with Macca and better than Renault and others.

It was mentioned during quali that having already known that they were out of contention of pole they focused alot more on an optimised race set up. Ted Kravitz said this so im not too sure on how serious you can treat that.

Yes but in testing we have to consider that McLaren had huge problems with the car so their panic solution was an exhaust copy of RB, I think they must change it during developments and "whoops" the McLaren is unbalanced

They took the complex system they had and apparently are working to optimise it for reliable use. I don't think that as soon as they develop their own ideas after copying RB's exhaust design is going to lead to an unbalanced car, seeing still that their version is still rather simplified.

[FrukostScones]

I have been saying for a year that Ferrari is going to drop out of the top team category as soon as the resource restrictions are hitting them fully. The present car was still designed with more resources than any other team could muster in 2010. Nevertheless they are 1 s behind the pace at the begin of the season.

My view is that Ferrari will have two choices very soon. They can throw all they have behind the F150 and neglect their 2012 car or they can address their inherent inefficiency and switch very early to the 2012 car. It will be interesting to see what they do. Whatever happens their biggest management issue is raising engineering efficiency. The only way to do this is to buy more top people away from other teams. So watch out for Ferrari on a shopping spree for Red Bull and McLaren talent.

Yawn! I dont see that Ferrari is 1s behind. Qualy and race are different things this year. Last year Ferrari had a period in which they had big problems and came back massively. I cant see those big problems in 2011, they are adjusting and will be strong.