2017 Singapore Grand Prix - Marina Bay, 15-17 September

[drunkf1fan]

Kinda strange why Vettel spend more time on soft tyres, isn`t it ?
Maybe in order to have an one stop race for taking a penalty due to a new turbo ???...

And some sims laps comparatives after FP2 : Lewis times seems to be on par with Ricci coz on the second stint he used the same used US tyres and went to the pits mid sim for some FW adjustments ...

If I'm remembering right Hamilton moved to softs for that last longer run and was doing very good times. Generally Merc seem to do better comparative to their placing in FP2 in long runs. Ricciardo's times are good though because if he didn't pit he's still doing 1:46.6-9's late in his stint on what would be his qualifying set. Ham's times on the ultrasofts weren't as good though his soft tire pace was excellent.

Bottas's pace seemed abysmal compared to Hamilton's either he just can't do it around here or he had setup completely wrong. He also did two shorter stints similar length to Hamilton but he was doing well one lap in the 1:47, most of the rest average out to say a 1:48.3 or so compared to Ham doing mid 1:46s, second stint he's doing an average 1:47.75 maybe while Ham was around 1:46.4. Neither Kimi or Vettel were showing particularly good times, first stint for ultras was similar to Ham but behind Ricciardo by a margin, the second stint on softs was significantly off what Ham was doing on the softs. Lastly, in terms of time spent on tires, not really. Most teams often have one driver do a shorter stint on ultras just to get a feel so they have that experience for the start so they can learn to feel where they drop off and then one driver will move to the harder tire so the team get data on both tires. Verstappen's longer run was on softs.

Ferrari and Bottas need big improvements tomorrow.

[ringo]

Maybe in order to have an one stop race for taking a penalty due to a new turbo ???...

I'd be shocked if that was the case, because this is probably the 2nd worst (Monaco being #1) track on the calendar to fight through the grid on.

Not exactly, this track offers good fighting and overtaking once strategy is right for the last stint.
This track produces good racing near the end of the race.

[tranquility2k4]

I actually think Merc are in a good position here. Red Bull often flatter on a Friday, e.g. Baku, Hungary. At Baku Merc looked 3rd fastest in short and long runs on Friday then were on pole by a second (yes very long straight but still). In Hungary Lewis was very quick in the race when in free air. Merc are often faster in the race to their rivals comparatively when compared with Friday long run analysis.

Ferrari is the strange one, they often have poor Fridays and then suddenly turn up in practice 3 with a massive step change. Saying this, there's often (but not always) a hint of their potential in the long runs, so I think I would be more concerned if I were Ferrari.

The Merc always seems in a league of its own on the soft tyre, both on low and high fuel, so if we have a 1 stop and a long stint on the soft then this is strong for Lewis.

Everything at Singapore is exaggerated due to the length of the lap and amount of corners so this could also be why RB are looking even stronger than usual with maybe a tad less fuel than the others. I think Lewis will fight the RBs for pole and Vettel will either be a little off the pace or will be fastest, I doubt it will be in between. It all depends if Ferrari are so confident that they're massively sandbagging.

[F1NAC]

Did Ferrari put new engine in?

[DVB]

Ferrari put some new engine parts. Not a complete set.

For those who wanted a wet race, 85% wet race tomorrow.

[Juzh]

Laptimes are piss poor across the board in 3d practice..??

[Shrieker]

Maxstappen reporting his car shifting gears on it's own, and the commentators from sky mentioned the EM from the subway below. Strange times

[Juzh]

Maxstappen reporting his car shifting gears on it's own, and the commentators from sky mentioned the EM from the subway below. Strange times

Known stuff about the EM on that part of the track.

[drunkf1fan]

Laptimes are piss poor across the board in 3d practice..??

The cars basically setup to the track in P1 but the wrong conditions as it's too early and hot, p2 is closer to qualifying/race conditions but still green track. P3 is difficult as they've started to set up for the evening temps and conditions but it's a session with higher temps that don't suit that setup and today the temps are particularly high. They also may be setting up with more chance of rain in mind making slight differences anyway.

Basically p3 ends up the less representative session as by then they are set up for lower temp evening runs but it's not yet that.

The speed should come back when it comes to qualifying and move beyond fp2 times.

[Juzh]

Laptimes are piss poor across the board in 3d practice..??

The cars basically setup to the track in P1 but the wrong conditions as it's too early and hot, p2 is closer to qualifying/race conditions but still green track. P3 is difficult as they've started to set up for the evening temps and conditions but it's a session with higher temps that don't suit that setup and today the temps are particularly high. They also may be setting up with more chance of rain in mind making slight differences anyway.

Basically p3 ends up the less representative session as by then they are set up for lower temp evening runs but it's not yet that.

The speed should come back when it comes to qualifying and move beyond fp2 times.

Yes, but a whole second off is a lot.

[drunkf1fan]

Maxstappen reporting his car shifting gears on it's own, and the commentators from sky mentioned the EM from the subway below. Strange times

Known stuff about the EM on that part of the track.

You'd think both bidding to extend contract to hold the race here and having so much experience that they'd have by this point attempted to install a bunch of extra shielding underneath the track to dampen the EM field from effecting the track.

[ChrisDanger]

[Juzh]

[atanatizante]

On one side, Lewis did his fastest lap on his lap to penultimate lap (the 8th from his 10 laps on the second stint) and on the other side Max, Ricci and Vettel did on their own in their first hot lap ...
What conclusions could we draw from that? Merc cars has lots of potential - at least in Lewis` case - but are struggling to switch the tyres on - particularly the fronts - (or in other words getting heat into the core of them)?
So it seems that Merc cars need more laps hence they could run more than others in all the qualy sessions and that could be the key bearing in mind here are many problems with the back makers ...

[drunkf1fan]

I think Ricciardo was going faster on two separate occasions but had his laps stopped, by red flag and then hitting the wall himself. I think in general they aren't close to their real top performance so all can do a few laps and the later it got the more the temps dropped and the faster the track was getting.

The biggest thing for Hamilton was he was one of the last to do a faster lap of the top guys as the track conditions were speeding up so it's very hard to judge. Also even Ricciardo going faster shouldn't be surprising as his time is actually quite slow.

FP3 is maybe the worst session for judging. FP1, they are just setting up to the track in general and getting used to the corners, curbs again but the setup is wrong time of day and temps. FP2 they start tuning the car to lower night time temps and dialing in, FP3 the cars are now tuned for the quali/race conditions and the high temps of earlier evening makes this the least representative session. They are going as fast as they can, a second off FP2 fastest time and just trying to make adjustments for corners rather than the conditions. Basically FP3 doesn't tell us an awful lot here.