f1316 wrote:godlameroso wrote:They say this is a power circuit, but is it really? If you can carry more speed through the end of Radillon, you can carry more speed up the hill. Red Bull proved this until 2013. I think Mercedes advantage is in sector two and three, because that's where the low to mid speed corners are. I don't think Mercedes is better than Ferrari or Red Bull in the really fast stuff like Pouhon or the very next turn.
I'm thoroughly confused now about where Mercedes biggest strengths really are. Barcelona sector times vs Ferrari made it seem as if it was all low speed - vettel only a tenth off in first two sectors but losing out massively in sector three.
But since then we've seen a relatively stronger Ferrari in Monaco and Hungary than in Silverstone or indeed high power tracks like Canada or Austria. This would lead one to believe that it's high speed where they excel.
Probably, the answer is they're generally stronger on all fronts and setup/updates are making it hard to isolate the differences. But will definitely interested to see if what you say turns out to be true as this may clarify things a bit.
Our friend has an answer.... Posted in Hungary thread.
On a serious note, how would one know if Merc is faster or not in sections like Pouhon? Because, last year, RB10 ran with a thin rear wing to enhance the performance on straights, whereas Mercs almost always preferred a high downforce setup even on circuits like Spa and Monza. Even this year, other than Hungary, there is no evidence to say RB is a match through any of the faster corners. Last year, in Sector 2 of Spa, Merc of Nico did 59.3 seconds in qualifying and Vettel did 60.0 and RB11 is isn't exactly better than RB10 and neither is W06 is vastly better than W05. Again this year, RB11 has to compromise on their downforce to accommodate straight line speed, so you won't see them matching Merc on Pouhon. It's a fact that, Merc PU is still ahead in terms of power generation compared to Ferrari and Ferrari have to think of compromising power vs downforce for this circuit and if they choose to concentrate logically on power and compromise on downforce (not to the extent of RB), they aren't going to be a match for Merc either on Sector 2. So, you will never get a good answer for the question of where Merc is faster. When you have a class of the field PU, there is every opportunity to add a lot of good/bad downforce and still be ahead and that is what Merc is doing so far.
The one catch for Mercs "NOW" is, what if they have another poor start with new rules, then to cover that aspect off, they need to concentrate on power as there is no guarantee that they can disappear from start line. Their setups in practice, would tell if they are believing so and if they do, then there is reason to believe they would compromise on downforce and might just be slower than W05 and inline with a F15T, but an RB11 isn't going to be a match here.
As for where the real difference is in terms of performance difference between W06 and F15T, I doubt if we would ever find concrete answers.
