Making Elimination Qualifying Work

So having watched this so-called "disaster" for Bahrain (and not thinking that it was terrible), I think I understand both what the intent of the plan was and why it doesn't work.

The intent of the plan is to draw out the tension of the session, where the number of eligible running cars is reduced as time goes on. The idea is that things get more and more frantic as the bar for continuing rises and rises.

There are two reasons why it doesn't work: the cars, and the sessions.

Firstly the cars. Modern F1 cars have evolved into these complicated science projects that are good for one thing -- running Grand Prix races. They are not suited to an elimination style qualification. The cars basically have one good timed lap in them, so we get the situation that we have had for the last two races: everyone boils out of the pits, sets one time, and that's it. There is practically no chance that a team could turn a car for a second timed run, and since for the first two sessions the number of cars being dropped is relatively small, for the vast majority of the runners there is absolutely zero point in even trying. Thus, empty track time. If you send a car with enough fuel for more than one timed run then you will be compromising both runs since you A) have to carry around the extra fuel for the extra timed run(s), and B) you have to go easier on your tires so that you don't root them out too early. Neither situation is conducive to setting a time which is ultimately competitive.

Secondly, the sessions. Since qualifying is still broken up into Q1, Q2, Q3, then for the majority of the field there simply is no incentive to even try to run a second time in the session -- the times are set, and moving from 10th to 8th means nothing in Q1.

So here's my idea for solving both problems:

A) Make the cars start on race-fuel (or some common, minimum fuel level; and B) run qualifying as a single session, with the elimination starting after 10 or 15 minutes.

Presto, everyone has to look after their tires; the cars get faster as the session winds down; everyone would have incentive to keep running to keep burning off the fuel load; changing to the softer tires would become a strategy as to when you'd do it; and setting times would always be relevant because the times are always live.

You'd also get an hour of on-track chaotic running which the media thinks the man-in-the-stands likes to watch.

F92A Memory

2015 Retrospective

So 2015 has come and gone, and frankly I expected it to be another waste of time. Nothing significant had changed at Ferrari -- Arrivabene and Vettel had both arrived too late to have significant input on the car's development, and with that in hand I didn't think that Ferrari would have any answer to any Mercedes-powered car, let alone the factory team running up front.

Shows what I know. Practically any other team would have killed to have had Ferrari's "bad year". A couple of wins, including the both pole and the win in Singapore. Second in the manufacturer's title, third and fourth in the driver's. And I believe Vettel's points haul rivals Alonso's from when Alonso was nearly champion a couple years back.

It was telling, though. The year that Alonso was nearly champion, we headed to Canada having had seven separate drivers as race winners for that year. This year we headed to Canada having had seven separate drivers as podium visitors for the year. Mercedes' reliability was epic, as was Vettel's machine-like predictability in picking up third. Although as a team fan I'm pleased with the result, it made for some dry racing.

Would Alonso have made out as well in this year's Ferrari? I'd like to say yes, but there's no way to know.

For the future, there's not much to say. None of the technical regulation proposals get me excited, and the fiddling around with a "cheap" motor and an equivalency formula just leaves me cold. The fact that the engines are hugely more efficient than what has come before is interesting, but really what draws people to the sport is the competition and the teams trying to come up with new technical solutions to close their gaps. Taking out in-season testing and engine development really puts a halt to that.

You really need multiple teams at the top with a fair chance to win on any given day, it makes the highs of winning higher and the lows of failing lower. You need a better reason for tuning in over "I wonder if Maldonaldo will run into anyone today?"

Driver Skill Is Obviously All-Important

Your finishers, in China 2015:



If only Sainz had not fallen out and spoiled a perfect finish.

Best Of The Rest

A solid 3-4 finish is pretty good, especially considering the mess of futility that last year was.  I am pretty happy about it.

Thinking about it, I think the deficiencies, we can assume that the Ferrari engine is a huge step forward this year.  Maybe not "Mercedes" class -- although the engine is powering perenial back-marker Sauber into more reasonable competitive results, and we know traditionally their car isn't much good -- but still pretty good (the engine).  So from that, I think that the Williams car is inferior to the Ferrari car, which fits with my theory of the Williams merely being the best also-ran last year which benefited from the Mercedes dominance.  With the Ferrari resurgence, Williams is once again behind the serious leaders.  The other Mercedes team that benefited last year, Force India, is similarly unremarkable, and Lotus is really just coming to grips with things.  Clearly, the Mercedes is less of an advantage this year.

Renault is in big trouble, and not just because Red Bull is threatening to have a temper tantrum and go home.  Their engine is where the Ferrari of 2014 was -- which was nowhere.

Red Bull having a gearbox which is apparently made of glass isn't helping any either.  This is the first post-Newey year, but you'd expect them to have their act together a little better than this.

Honda is of course the worst of the worst, but that's because they are in their first year and anyways are showing a surprising amount of realism in their expectations.  I think Q2 is a reasonable goal for this year, judging from what's happened so far this year.

For me, I think this is as good as we can expect for this year.  Ferrari isn't going to take the race to the Mercedes week in and week out, but with reliability they can collect solid points and be there for when the Mercedes duo trip over each other.  Perhaps in the desert at Bahrain things might go better, and perhaps at circuits where engine power is less important (ie: Monaco) they will have a chance, but for me the titles are already out of reach.  And frankly I'm okay with that.

Win!

Well that was entirely unexpected.

Let's deconstruct it a little bit.  In hindsight, two things are clear to me.  First, the Mercedes is not as kind to its tires as the Ferrari is.  Second, Mercedes made two strategy mistakes, in not holding back enough option tires for Sunday, and in making the pit stop under safety car in the first place.

If we game this out a bit, then what would have happened is that after the safety car the Mercedes cars would have led, then pitted for prime tires.  Vettel would have made his only stop under green and come out behind the Mercedes.  Then when the Mercedes cars pitted again, they would be much closer together.  The Mercedes would be a faster car on fresher tires, but with the Ferrari handling its tires much more gently it might have been more interesting in the closing stages.  If Hamilton was truly unhappy with his car, he might have been persuaded by Vettel to make a mistake.  But I think that unlikely, I think Vettel would be more content to not risk his second place.

Mercedes' strategy mistake of not holding back another set of options is probably a direct result of the car being harder on its tires.

But all of this is affected in unpredictable ways because of the heat on Sunday.  Did the Mercedes suffer?  Hamilton's comments suggest that maybe they did.  They seemed to struggle a bit, while both Ferrari cars ran with good pace throughout the race.

Due to the heat I don't think we can call this solid competition yet, or even a championship horse race.  Lets wait and see how things play out in China, or better yet once the series returns to Europe.

But for now, I'll take it.

Here We (well some of us) Go!

Boy F1 looked absolutely terrible in Australia, didn't they? Let's tot it up:

• Bottas gets hurt, forcing Williams to withdraw a car;
• Kvyat and Magnusson blow up on the out-lap to the grid;
• and two Manor cars never turn a wheel all weekend.

Fifteen cars take the green light.  And then in the first lap we lose the two Lotus cars.  And then -- and then! -- McLaren almost limp home into the points with a hamster-on-a-wheel engine.  Eleven finishers, and it wasn't even raining.

F1 in general needs to get their acts together or they are going to be in trouble.

The entire farce just about makes me want to look into this WEC thing.

What we learned, Misadventure-Down-Under edition:

• Mercedes has resumed normal service after doing something else during winter testing.  The World Championship celebratory parties are scheduled back at the factory for the same time this year as last.  Thank you for standing by.
• Ferrari has made a huge step forward.  Whether it is real will have to wait for a sustained effort from Williams, plus deferred judgement on Lotus, but podiums don't look impossible this year.
• Vettel looked pretty good in the car all weekend.
• Raikkonen can't buy luck.   A first corner squeeze and then two messed up pit stops.  Apart from those problems the weekend suggests 2015 will be better than last year.
• The McLaren-Honda is just as miserable as testing suggested it would be and it isn't clear that there is enough change available to fix the problem.  Honda really got screwed by coming into the formula a year late, although if they'd done it properly and made a rocket everyone would be saying how much of an advantage being out the extra year was.  One wonders if Alonso's symptoms will perhaps linger a little as there are probably no points on offer for him this year.
• The Ferrari revival is all-around -- Sauber's performance with the same motor in the back shows that this year they have it together.
• Speaking about Sauber, I still don't care who does or does not drive for them.
• Hopefully once Renault shows up their cars will make it to the grid without ingesting engines.  Riccardo and Sainz both seem to have used up one of their four engines for the year, as has Magnusson.  All told, between Renault and Honda, this is the kind of "reliability" we were afraid of last year, and last year it turned out incredibly well.
• At this point, Manor isn't a real F1 team -- they just seem to have some pit/paddock passes they've stolen from somewhere.