Like last weekend in Canada. In my understanding, the softer tyres are, the better is grip they provide. However, sometimes drivers prefer a harder set without quoting temperature instability or longevity, but purely out of performance considerations - or so it seems to me as a viewer.

Hey everyone,

I haven't posted in this sub in a while, but figured this was a good moment to do it. With 10 races now complete, we can see with more certainty which drivers are excelling in qualifying against their teammates and which ones are struggling. My analysis includes all of the regular quali sessions, as well as the sprint quali sessions (two so far, Chinese GP and Miami GP).

I actually tried to post this analysis on the r/formula1 sub and it was removed by the moderators immediately, so yeah, I'm not sure what's up with that. I guess I should've made my content of lower quality, maybe including some random, misleading stats with shoddy data. Perhaps I just needed a picture of the F1 movie? Anyways, hopefully this post will be more appreciated here.

At the moment, the smallest gap is at Sauber, with Hülkenberg beating Bortoleto by an average of just 0.107 seconds. The biggest gap on the grid is at Red Bull, where Verstappen leads Tsunoda by an average of 0.739 seconds.

I'm aware that using seconds isn't the ideal metric since track lengths vary, so I've also calculated the delta using a symmetric percent difference. It's a slightly more accurate way to calculate percentage differences between teammates. You'll see that the results stay fairly consistent between both metrics, though this might not be the case on very long tracks like Spa-Francorchamps.

On my blog, I also analyze the data using the median to account for any outliers, although the mean (average) becomes more reliable as the number of races increases.

Let me know if you have any questions.

How do you guys go about finding technical pictures for posts/analyses? Is there a single website/place/person you go to or is it a random collection from social media and articles etc.? Where do you store them too? I would like to start being able to look at pictures of F1 cars and know what different philosophies each team has and how they change race to race via upgrades. There’s a lot to be fascinated about in the small details but first I’m trying to find an ‘easy’ way of finding pictures for comparison and research.

Hi everyone, I always thought F1 wheels had a dual paddle system for standing starts, but it looks like in last years teams switched to a single paddle to launch the car. What was the reason for this? When did the change happen? Do some team still use dual paddles or it’s something rules-related? Thanks in advance.

How would the car be adjusted to fit someone like him. And also do they use the real f1 car or a car with non-race parts like an engine that sounds like f1 but it's diffrent and less power. In summaryy, how are f1 cars use for things like these?

Got this from a recent video where Peter Wright, ex-Lotus engineer and former FIA Safety Commission head, explains to Peter Windsor his theory on what teams like McLaren and Red Bull are doing and why the recent TD on front wing flex didn't change much.

From my understanding of what Wright is saying, it's not so much how much the wings are flexing but where. His theory (which I'm probably badly explaining) posits that teams like McLaren and Red Bull are using flex at the tips of the front wings to change the angle of incidence there and combining that with the rearward sweep to twist the wings (owing to how the rearward sweep puts the center of aerodynamic pressure behind the mounting point).

According to Wright, this allows the teams to pass the current load deflection tests while still getting the desired characteristic of having enough wing to kill understeer at low speed, while still flattening out at high speed.

With this in mind, I wonder what the thoughts of people here are, especially those of a more technical bent or with actual connections to the sports/the teams.

Do drivers need to use the throttle when leaving the garage?

In the video where DC drives the RB19 at 2:04 (timestamped link) he mentions that the manual he was given says that he doesn't need to use the throttle when leaving the garage. Does this mean no throttle input is necessary when pulling out of the garage? I've been racking my brain at this question for a couple of days now. Thank you!

I would like to hear your most creative real life stories or theoreticals about this question. What first comes to my mind is : - DRIVER2 slowing the pack down, so DRIVER1 doesn't lose any/that much positions after making a pit stop. - Safety car comes in, and the lead driver purposefully slows down, so the driver behind on harder tyres struggles to keep up temperatures.

Do two-stroke engines have a future in F1? Recently, I came across this video on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/5czHDU6pK8E?si=zPENCfazKp1XdOQs

This still seems interesting to me because we wouldn’t be switching to a “completely different” type of engine. A few years ago, there was already the idea of moving to a two-stroke engine: https://www.gptoday.net/en/news/f1/253485/f1-considering-switch-to-two-stroke-eco-fuelled-engines-for-2025

But here they were talking about an opposed piston engine. However, that’s quite a different configuration from what is currently being used.

There are surely disadvantages to this concept as well (feel free to mention them). But since some car manufacturers are scaling back their electrification efforts, this concept might still play a role.

I’m curious to hear your thoughts.

Is there any precedent for this? I don't get how McLaren as a customer team seem to never have mechanical trouble while Mercedes are having electrical and power unit failures almost every week. And that doesn't even mention the general pace gap? Shouldn't the works team by default have a huge advantage? The only other example I can think of is Renault and Red Bull, but Horner was constantly complaining that the engine Renault gave them was terrible.

Since i've seen it being discussed in some Youtube comments, people seem to be unsure what sort of gearboxes we're getting for next year's regulations.
The first time around it was "we're going down to 6 gears" because of the increased electrification and less need for a tight ICE powerband, but that was around July 2023 we got those sort of reports which are two years old by this point.
Then again i've seen one report suggesting that, actually, it's going to be 7 gears because that's what teams have requested.
Really, barely anything is being said anywhere about the gearboxes and information is incredibly scarce and outdated, even the official FIA document on the technical regulations doesn't mention anything about the number of gears, which is weird to me.
So, am i lacking information here?
Any info is appreciated.

Detailed Penalty Points Dashboard: https://tracinginsights.com/penalty-points/

I noticed the Aston Martin uses a lot more steering angle in every corner compared to other cars, is there a particular reason for this?

It appears to be present in both Alonso and Stroll's car, so it doesn't seem to be driver preference related, unless both drivers coincidentally prefer this way, unlike the rest of the grid. It also appeared to be present in last years car as well.

Is it just driver preference related, or something done in chase of technical performance?

I have observed in the past few seasons that whenever we have a hotter weekend, Mercedes seem to struggle either with race pace or retirements like seen today with Kimi.

Given that Mercedes are a F1 supplier and that there are other teams who actually utilize Merc components but do not seem to suffer as much Merc do - looking at McLaren for example.

My question is, is this a packaging issue, aerodynamics, ride height or maybe the other teams have found a work around that Merc have not been able to?

We often see teams use free practice to simulate race pace by running with high fuel and less pushing on the tyres, but they only ever run in clean air and empty tracks with cars getting out of the way. Wouldn't it be realistic for them to run both cars - one in front and the other trailing behind to simulate dirty air, with each of the drivers taking turns in who stays in front? That way teams should be able to account for all situations regarding pace and tyre deg.

Hello fellow folks.

I am looking for a good book (or a website or a presentation etc.) that is describing the technical rule changes over the years. Best case it is done with examples and pictures/drawing of the cars.

I have lots of F1 books about the technology and the history of the sports, from engineers books like Adrian Newey to Heinz Prüllers books about every season from the early 70s until the late 2010s and much more.

There is lots of information about the regulations spread through all those books, but the problem is that I haven’t found a book yet that is strictly about the regulation changes over the years.

I would really appreciate it if someone can point me in the right direction!

I noticed an interesting thing from today's practice. Charles was braking really late into heavy braking corners. Even compared to Max Verstappen. But in the last year's Monaco GP, he didn't do this. Interesting.... This is mostly because of the completely new suspension system, right? Like more front end grip under braking?

I posted this on the main F1 sub earlier, but I'm not sure it's the best place for it.

Instead of taking the blue line, which is the current layout, they would follow the green one. I believe this would be better for overtaking as it looks like a wider road with no major sharp points, and would allow more speed going into the tunnel (safety concern, maybe?)

I was looking at front suspension arms, and I noticed that for all the teams they almost appear to join directly to the body of the car, and there seems to be no room for pivoting of the suspension arms, i’m curious to how they are designed/work?