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.
This year the cars are going through a few changes. As of right now in testing teams are still shaking down some of their new cars but are running 1'13s in Valencia. Last year we saw quick times of mid 1'11 and low 1'12s. Testing is not a good example of the pace of the cars surely but does anyone have an idea with the new tires and such?.
"It's Villeneuve, the young man from Ontario, Canada.....no excuse me, that's Quebec, Canada." -Martin Brundle
I heard the value of 2 seconds/lap for how much slower the Pirelli's were than the Bridgestones at last years tests. Let's assume they've managed to improve that to say 1.5 seconds and then assume that the cars of 2011 are 0.5 seconds slower than 2010 (Ross Brawn stated they'd got most of the lost downforce back with no DDD). This brings us back to the 2 seconds value, almost entirely due to tyres.
I'd say that's a good estimate and it will only improve as the year goes on.
