FIA Doublespeak

Charlie Whiting talks engine maps and diffusers:

[...]

Q: Why now?

A: Because it's illegal.

Q: So why not punish the teams that have been using it?

A: Because we say that it's 'arguably' illegal. The FIA technical department can only give an opinion. The stewards are the ones that decide whether or not the opinion of the technical department is correct. [...]

I'm sure the logic of this comes down to a couple of things: first, the Stewards don't want the Technical Delegates making definitive declarations of what is or is not illegal. That would be like parking officers making declarations about what you can or cannot do with your car.

Second, the Technical Delegates don't have standing to bring forward a complaint to the Stewards as they can't be the aggrieved party. The FIA likes the system where things are investigated as they are complained about, as enlightened self interest tends to keep complaints to a minimum. In this case, practically everyone is doing exhaust-blown diffusers to some extent, so if anyone protests them they are likely to get counter-protested right back and nobody wins. An example of I'll let you cheat because you know I'm cheating.

The other thing that this system does is it encourages teams to keep knowledge of any technical violations on the parts of their competitors quiet, so that they can be sprung at a tactically opportune time. Say for example when there were Bridgestone and Michelin tires in the series, and the Michelins got excluded at a critical juncture of the season because of the way they were constructed.

The whole thing is borderline unethical. If the rules are there, play by them. If you know of a rules violation, report it.

Stupid Regulations

I'm more than a bit peeved that I added an entire extra hour on the end of the scheduled grand prix time, and it STILL managed to cut out just before the end of the 2 hour rain delay. So I got to see almost NO racing.

Also disappointed by the poor Ferrari showing. Alonso's tire gamble for intermediates backfired, and Massa managed to be in the wars. The rain was always going to make Sunday into a lottery, effectively wasting the good qualifying showing. As I commented on Saturday, it's amazing what a poor season will do for lowering standards of good news.

Also pathetic was Hamilton's trail of "incidents". He banged wheels with Webber with no consequence, then banged wheels with his team mate which managed to only put himself out. He also had a safety car speed violation, which was rendered academic by his self-inflicted elimination. I think Lauda goes too far when he claims Hamilton is going to get someone killed; but I think he needs to settle down just a bit perhaps.

But hey, let's give props to Button for being the clear master of the conditions -- fighting back from extra pit stops and a drive-through in order to put pressure on Vettel at the end, and being able to take advantage of a Vettel's uncharacteristic mistake on the last lap. I agree with Button, this was probably his greatest victory so far in his career.

Scapegoat

Continuing the theme of taking decisions for 2012: Ferrari has selected the first scapegoat for the poor results yielded in 2011. Technical Director Aldo Costa has stepped down, and has been stashed in the Ferrari road car division (at full F1 pay, good for him) to work out the remainder of his contract.

Moving Costa to the road car division is a curious decision on Ferrari's (or Fiat's) part -- it could be seen as an effort to honor the contract they had with him, or it could be seen as an effort to deny his services to a competing F1 team.

Either way it doesn't look good. In the first explanation they are admitting that this could be more of a political shake up at the F1 team; in the second, they are admitting that Costa might be good enough to make a difference at another team -- which is also an admission that this is a political, rather than a technical, change.

Also consider statements claiming that the 2012 car has already been started. May is a bit early to be actively designing the next year's car, this usually starts in late July or August. This all makes it look like the 2011 season is already being written off as sub-par.

CFD Not Wirth Exclusivity

...ok that was a bit belabored.

Virgin Racing has split with Nick Wirth:

Following a board meeting post-Monaco, Marussia Virgin Racing has halted its technical collaboration with Wirth Racing Technologies and boss Nick Wirth, the designer of the Virgin race chassis.

This represents a serious setback to those backing Computed Fluid Dynamics (or CFD) as a primary driver of chassis aerodynamic design.

CFD theoretically eliminates the need to spend expensive time using wind tunnels and models to study the effects of aerodynamic elements on a car. If a team can rely on CFD, it either reduces the potential design and development costs for the team, or it frees up money for other parts of operating the race team.

Many of the current teams use CFD as part of their process, however the bulk of the work is still done in wind tunnels.

Virgin was the first team to commit to using CFD as the primary source of aerodynamic design information. Both cars that the team produced have come from this method.

The results have been lacking. This year the Virgins are still struggling in Q1 with little to show that they are ready to take on even Team Lotus, let alone the other "3rd tier" teams that have longer histories in the sport.

This is the time of year to be taking decisions which will affect the 2012 campaign, and Virgin has decided to return to a more traditional way of developing cars.

In the long run, development of more advanced CFD systems coupled with cheaper and faster compute cycles will lead to CFD being a more reliable source of aerodynamic information; however I think the state of the art still has much further to go before it can replace the wind tunnel.

Green Tires

For a sport obsessed with their "green" image, the FIA certainly makes some strange rules decisions.

While there are some changes which are arguably more "green" -- for example, removing the need to be on "race fuel" during qualifying sessions, and eliminating the need to "burn off" fuel prior to qualifying runs -- there are others which clearly are not "green".

I'm thinking of the tires specifically. While the number of tires used through a weekend is still limited, the tires themselves have a useful service life of perhaps 20 laps before degradation starts to impact performance. So you end up with more pit stops.

You also end up with a lot of this:



...a lot of little rubber balls, colloquially referred to as "marbles", accumulating off the racing line.

Not the best "green" image for a sport in general, or for the tyre manufacturer in particular.

Changing Them Goalposts

The FIA has changed the direction of car development for 2011 by deciding that blown diffusers are to be deemed "movable aerodynamic devices". They do this by once again defining the obvious:

To push this regulation change through, the FIA has deemed that throttle use will be allowed only for the purpose of increasing torque, not for 'aerodynamic performance'.

Some people give this feature credit for Red Bull's dominance over the rest of the field, but it remains to be seen if this will actually change anything at the front.

The FIA has thus far been silent as to the reason behind the change in rules interpretation.

Update, perhaps 20 minutes later: Or not:

Formula 1 teams have been given a reprieve to continue using blown diffusers freely from this weekend's Spanish Grand Prix, AUTOSPORT can reveal, after the FIA had a rethink about going ahead with a major change to the regulations.

[...]

A high level source indicated that the decision had been taken because a number of 'unforeseen and unintended consequences' of the ban had been brought to the FIA's attention.

Want to bet one of of those "unforeseen" consequences was the Red Bull being relegated to running with the Lotus cars?

What We Learned: Turkey 2011

Well that was fun, wasn't it? Thoughts and reflections on Turkey, 2011:

• Nice Circuit, Shame About The Place: Turkey has consistently provided entertaining races; however it's location in the middle of nowhere in a country without enough interest to make the race a viable concern for the organizers means we may not be back in future years. This is sad because Turkey introduced a good circuit into the schedule. While F1 may not miss the event, I think the larger population of vierwers will.
• Go Go Gadget Racecar: this year with DRS and KERS in fine form we got to see many passes that in previous years wouldn't have happened. And yet it wasn't an automatic-pass system; cars had to have more than a trivial advantage over the car they were chasing to make the pass good. This is good for sporting's sake -- the faster car should get in front of the slower car -- but it means that we may be denied epic battles for position where a driver can keep his faster opponent back. Overall though it is definitely different from the racing we've had in the past. I'm not entirely sold on DRS, but I'm entertained.
• Ferrari Circuit: For some reason, the Ferrari team goes well at this circuit, with Alonso providing what is only the team's first podium of 2011. Consider Massa's domination of the event with three wins in a row. The Ferrari still has qualifying issues, but in race trim it is... well, it is faster. Personally I think that had McLaren not had issues with Hamilton's car and had Button been on the more competitive strategy... well I don't think the Ferrari would have been third. But being positioned to take advantage of other team's mistakes and bad luck is the first step in being lucky yourself, and Alonso is giving the Ferrari everything he can.
• Tired of Tires: Personally I'm starting to have doubts about the Pirelli tires. Having tires that are only good for 20 laps or so, with a restriction on how many sets a team can use over a weekend... this to me is not a good combination. Some of the shots of turn 8* showed a field of large marbles, and this was early on in the race. For a series that is trying to become "green" and "environmental", requiring the use of these extremely disposable parts that are nothing more than an entertainment gimmick perhaps is not consistent.
• Past His Best Before: Schumacher's comeback continues to underwhelm. His banging wings and wheels early on in the race defending against already-done passes does little to redeem his lack of qualifying pace. The TV commentators observed that Schumacher needs at least a podium from this return to avoid losing face, and that's probably true. Schumacher is definitely not having fun these days. I agree that even if this return ends up being a waste of time that it will not damage his ultimate reputation too much, his records will stand for at least as long as it takes Vettel to eclipse them.
• Speaking Of Whom: Vettel was mighty this weekend, going from a crash on Friday morning, to pole, to winning convincingly. This is definitely the driver and car to beat so far in 2011.
• Opposite Ferrari: While Ferrari qualifies poorly and then races well, the Mercedes seems to have the opposite problem. Rosberg is qualifying well, but is perhaps getting let down by the Mercedes' lack of ultimate race pace.

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*= leaving aside the crazy idea that a single "turn" can be three apexes separated by individual straight segments.