how much the way the car is developed can favor one driver?

[vall]

Hello there,

How much do you think the way an F1 car is developed during the season can favor one of the drivers? At the beginning of this year Heiki was many times faster that Hamilton, but as the season unfolded he completely lost contact? The end of last season Hamilton also had the edge over Alonso. Also Kubica - Heidfeld this year.

Alonso complained about the team, not Hamilton last year. Could it be because they developed the car to suit Hamilton's style and didn't care what Alonso wanted? Also Kubica complained about the same at BMW.

Any thoughts?

[Jersey Tom]

Keep in mind that each driver has different engineers working for him and setting the car up. Both cars are different, not the same.

[vall]

yes, but still, the general development should the same. The set-up is another story.

[DaveKillens]

I tend to think otherwise. The story of Michael Schumacher at Ferrari is also a story of the engineers designing a car that suited him personally. For instance, since Michael came from karts, he preferred a front end that turned in smartly, and the cars that were built for him had that engineered in. And there's the change from dual keel to single, to zero keel. For the entire time Michael was at Ferrari, no race car had zero keel, even though many other teams were exploring this new approach to improved aerodynamics. As soon as Michael retired, the next iteration of F1 car had zero keel.

[donskar]

davekillens is right on.

To site a real-life example, Ross Brawn set the general design parameters to favor M Schu (naturally), then Byrne designed the car to meet those criteria. As the season progressed the general line of development favored Schu's style (naturally!).

Yes, each driver has a personal engineer, but their adjustments and settings can not - for example - take a car designed to oversteer and change it to an understeerer.

[Conceptual]

davekillens is right on.

To site a real-life example, Ross Brawn set the general design parameters to favor M Schu (naturally), then Byrne designed the car to meet those criteria. As the season progressed the general line of development favored Schu's style (naturally!).

Yes, each driver has a personal engineer, but their adjustments and settings can not - for example - take a car designed to oversteer and change it to an understeerer.

After many hours in rFactor, I would say that ballast ballance can actually do just that...

I would probably say it would be philosophies (like davekillens said) like snap steering, and maybe kerb riding that really make the difference here...