1611 replies to this topic

[Mandzipop]

One of the purposes of testing is to identify reliability issues. However, it's also there to for a number of other issues. Losing what amounts to a full day of their day of a testing program is always going to be a bad thing.

The bolded bit is exactly what they were doing today. It is the only true way of testing reliability.

[Treads]

You really shouldn't have gone any further. **** happens. They are doing dog work all week. Most of the teams will have some problematic days. Better the first day and get on with it.

No need to be so confrontational in tone. Do you talk to people like this in real life?

Clearly Merc would have preferred this not to happen. Their ideal would be to have no reliability issues, and use the 12 days to sail through set-up work, aero evaluation etc. Anything they didn't do today, they have to do tomorrow. Anything they would have done tomorrow, they have to do the day after. Etc. All the way to the end of the tests. They won't catch up, this is 1 of 12 testing days gone. I'm not saying it's a disaster, far from it, but clearly it won't help.

[ApexMouse]

Red Bull

Mark Webber: "It was pretty good. As Adrian said at the launch, there haven't been big changes to the regulations this year and the car is an evolution of the one we finished with last season, so there were no big surprises. I think most of the drivers will sit back tonight and think today's times were pretty competitive.

"It was actually like a Friday practice session in some regards. We started understanding the tyres and there were a lot of positives," he added. "There's a bit of housekeeping we have to get on top of but, other than that, it's been encouraging. The car feels similar to last year's, so the main difference is the tyres. With these tyres you're always on your toes. It was good that we had consistent temperatures today, so we got a lot of information and feedback to analyse, which is all good. Generally though, the car feels pretty good, so I'm happy."

Ferrari

Felipe Massa: "I would say the difference compared to last year is huge, it is on a different planet. This year is much more balanced and I felt a good direction from the rear of the car as well. There is a still lot to do, a lot to understand the right direction to make the car ready for the first race."

Lotus

Romain Grosjean: "The feeling is good from the E21; it feels very similar to the E20 from behind the wheel, even if it does look different from the outside. Once again Enstone has produced a car that is quick from the very first lap. We spent a little bit more time than ideal in the garage today, but that's normal in testing. I'm happy we completed 54 laps, and even happier that all of them were quick.

"We now have a good idea of the new tyres and we'll have some challenges from them; the grip level is there but performance does fall away with graining. That said, Jerez is a very specific track in this regard. The speed came easy today and we didn't respond to the other cars going faster in the afternoon. We should go even better tomorrow."

Mercedes

Nico Rosberg: "At the start of winter testing, you often encounter small issues because the car you're running is a brand new design. We had an electrical problem this morning and, once we had found the root cause, chose to modify the parts to make sure it didn't happen again.

"Of course, at this time of year all you want to do is spend time in the car and get a feeling for how it's working, but these hiccups are just part of the game. During the laps I completed this morning, I had a good feeling with the car and it felt solid.

Force India

Paul Di Resta: "A positive first day and we managed to cover lots of laps - so that's the most important thing. I felt very comfortable all day and we managed to get through the programme as we focussed on collecting aero data and understanding how well the car correlates with our simulation tools at the factory.

"We also started trying to learn as much about the tyres as possible so that we can carry that into tomorrow and optimise the set-up. The new compounds are quite different with the new construction and I've already felt a difference with the balance of the car in the low and high speed parts of the lap."

Williams

Pastor Maldonado: "We had no problems today and the car felt very consistent so we were able to learn a lot, which will be useful for the FW35 development. We planned to run the FW34 to enable us to have a reliable car to test the new tyres with and also try some different set-ups. It's great to finally be back on track after what felt like a long winter and I'm confident we can achieve a lot this week."

Toro Rosso

Daniel Ricciardo: "It's good to be back behind the wheel of a Formula 1 car. It was a long day to complete 70 laps, however, the main thing is that the car was reliable, which is a positive aspect and we got through our work schedule for the day.

"You cannot look at car performance on the first day, when reliability and comfort are more important and, on that front, my seat and driving position were good. So this was a day of tasks that were relatively simple, but also important."

Caterham

Giedo van der Garde: "First it's great to be back at work and I'm pleased with how day one on track has gone. We completed a very decent number of laps today without any major issues and I was pretty comfortable in the car straight away.

"Day one is all about making sure everything in the car works as it's supposed to and apart from a couple of minor issues with the floor we didn't really have to make any changes to the car straight out of the box. We also ran through a number of procedures that are new to me, particularly starts as we didn't do too many of those last year, but the main thing for me is the tyres. They definitely feel different to what I ran in the Friday sessions I did in 2012 and that's going to be a focus for us in the tests, to get as much as we can out of them.

"It's obviously far too early to make any judgements on the performance levels we can expect from the 2013 package but compared to the car I drove in Brazil it feels like we've made some good progress over the winter. Tomorrow will be more of the same for us - running through more procedures and a few setup options across the range of tyres we have available here and hopefully getting as many laps in as possible."


Thieved from SSF1.

Edited by ApexMouse, 05 February 2013 - 18:20.

[Raziel]

No need to be so confrontational in tone. Do you talk to people like this in real life?

Clearly Merc would have preferred this not to happen. Their ideal would be to have no reliability issues, and use the 12 days to sail through set-up work, aero evaluation etc. Anything they didn't do today, they have to do tomorrow. Anything they would have done tomorrow, they have to do the day after. Etc. All the way to the end of the tests. They won't catch up, this is 1 of 12 testing days gone. I'm not saying it's a disaster, far from it, but clearly it won't help.

1 of 12 testing days gone? They won't catch up? Don't be silly! Tomorrow or the day after they can simply do 100+ laps and that is it, normal service resumed.

[Treads]

Frequently yes, though not with anybody. Don't take it too personally.

But they will.

That is exactly what you are saying

Okay fine :-)

Clearly your definition of disaster is different from mine.

Re: catching up - do you think they will catch up with the level of testing they could have performed had they not had this wiring loom failure at any point in the 12 days of testing? Because I hold it as a self-evident fact, ceterus paribus, that they will not. Hence their preparation will not be as good as it could have been.

Anyway this is nitpicking. My position is as follows: losing a full day of testing is not a good thing, it will not help their situation. But it is not a disaster. That surely can't be excessively controversial can it?

[PayasYouRace]

Report from trackside.

Overview

These are simply my thoughts from being at the track. They reflect my own observations and gut feelings and may have very little to do with how the cars were doing.

It was a lovely day. There weren't as many fans at the track as last year. I put that down to the poor economy coupled to the lack of Alonso. Many English speakers round the track. Nothing beats seeing F1 cars live. The colours are far more vibrant, the sounds more visceral and that wonderful smell of burning rubber. The air was cool but in the sun it was just about t-shirt weather at midday. There was a fair bit of activity in the morning. Then a lull early afternoon before a last rush of all teams in the last couple of hours.

I heartily recommend attending a Jerez test if you can. VIP tickets are 20 Euros and give you access to the main grandstand as well as the area between the last corner and the back straight.

These are my particular observations of each team. In no particular order.

Mercedes

I arrived at the track to see the W04 being loaded onto a lorry. Didn't see any more of it.

Marussia

Best Lap 1m24.176s Laps 29

The Marussia looked pretty good in real life. The red really stands out, though at a distance it can be confused with the Red Bull. Chilton seemed to be driving cautiously. I'm guessing his own inexperience coupled with what might be a difficult car to push hard. Seemed especially unstable under braking. The Marussia made a particularly loud POP on the upchange which was quite distinctive ( to the old farts who say you can't tell the cars by their sound any more). Sadly I wasn't near enough the corner where Max binned it so I couldn't see much of that.





Toro Rosso

Best Lap 1m20.401s Laps 70

The STR didn't look particularly fast but certainly looked stable. They got a lot of running in. Ricciardo seemed to have something of an obsession with di Resta's gearbox. On at least 3 occassions he was catching the Force India and did some slipstreaming on both straights. That was rather unusual. Other than that not much to comment on.





Force India

Best Lap 1m20.343s Laps 89

di Resta was pounding round all day, and I mean pounding. He looked like he was on qualy laps all the time. Sliding round on the power, getting on the grass and snaking under braking. However he always looked fairly in control. The team seem to have stolen a march on the others in the reliability stakes.





Lotus

Best Lap 1m19.796s Laps 54

The Lotus looked fast today. Under braking the car looked particularly skittish, but elswhere it looked well planted. Grosjean was driving a bit wildly and seemed to be pushing hard, but the car seemed to handle it. He had a minor off at one point but it did no damage. Prepare for commentator confusion with the Toro Rosso. Had a somewhat distinctive sound on the upchange, especially going into 7th under the "flying saucer" race control building. Car looked fantastic though. The gold looked a lot nicer in real life.






Ferrari

Best Lap 1m20.536s Laps 64

The car looked pretty fast at times but I felt Massa wasn't giving the full beans. He seemed a bit cautious on the throttle and when he pushed harder the car seemed a bit twitchy. The car also looked a but snaky under braking. Felipe seemed to struggle getting into the final hairpin. Looks superb though, and has a lovely sound. Interesting off-throttle whine. Also sounds great on the pit limiter, with a melodious "wa-wa-wa-wa". Ferrari were obviously on a program of aero tests with Massa doing a number of constant speed runs on the straights. There were also a number of burnouts and practice starts plus a lot of driving through the pits and stop-and-gos.





Continued in part 2...

[jjcale]

Report from trackside.
....

Cheers.

Never been. Might try to get out there for Friday.

Where's the best place to sit??

di Resta was pounding round all day, and I mean pounding. He looked like he was on qualy laps all the time. Sliding round on the power, getting on the grass and snaking under braking. However he always looked fairly in control. The team seem to have stolen a march on the others in the reliability stakes.

That sounds awesome!!

Edited by jjcale, 05 February 2013 - 18:58.

[Raziel]

Okay fine :-)

Clearly your definition of disaster is different from mine.

Re: catching up - do you think they will catch up with the level of testing they could have performed had they not had this wiring loom failure at any point in the 12 days of testing? Because I hold it as a self-evident fact, ceterus paribus, that they will not. Hence their preparation will not be as good as it could have been.

Anyway this is nitpicking. My position is as follows: losing a full day of testing is not a good thing, it will not help their situation. But it is not a disaster. That surely can't be excessively controversial can it?

It is only a first day of testing, they have whole 11 days to catch up what? About 40-50 laps? They are at this moment a little behind, but at the end of testing they can be team with most mileage. They are not -100/200 laps behind all other leading teams with one day of testing left. Two long stints and there you have your lost 40 laps from the first day.

[gm914]

Great recap PAYR, looking forward to your part 2

[PayasYouRace]

Cheers.

Never been. Might try to get out there for Friday.

Where's the best place to sit??



That sounds awesome!!

Get the VIP ticket. Get to the main grandstand so you can see the garages. From the back-top of the stand you get a fantastic view of T3-5. Then it's a short walk to the area outside the final turn, but there's no seating there.

[TF110]

The comments are great about the cars 'look' and how they seem to drive. But it's only day 1. They're all on new tires, so the good driving/bad driving cars can change in a day or a week or even at the first race. Just hope to see the teams get on top of understanding the new tires and putting forth more laps tomorrow.

[PayasYouRace]

Oh I told you di Resta was giving it some.

[PayasYouRace]

Part 2

Red Bull

Best Lap 1m19.709s Laps 73

If there's one thing I took from watching the RBR was how it was completely planted under braking. Webber took it into the final corner (which is a tricky downhill braking zone) with total confidence time and time again and it never looked out of shape. Hit the apex every time. Looked a little worse on traction but everything points to this car being "born the right way". Regular runs throughout the day. Purple looks great on the car. The car also has a distinct sound. Nice on track but like a cement mixer on the pit limiter.





Sauber

Best Lap 1m20.699s Laps 79

Saw a lot of the Sauber too. Nico gave the car a number of acceleration-coast runs on the straights. The car looked fairly stable and consistent. Sadly, it didn't look as cool as I thought it would. In real life it looked rather bland.





Caterham

Best Lap 1m21.915s Laps 64

I was surprised to see that Caterham had completed so many laps because I hardly noticed them - strange considering how bright their green is. A really nice looking car in the sunshine. Can't say much about the car. Also had slightly clunky upchanges. Generally looked solid.





Williams

Best Lap 1m20.864s Laps 84

Williams are a bit of an odd case because they were running the old car. Lots of running as expected. I'm sure they got some good tyre data. Still some interesting observations. Pastor was driving like...Pastor. He nearly lost it coming into the pits at one point. At least it seemed like it as I just lost sight of him as I was moving to a new viewing area. The car ran with a modesty panel on the nose which I found odd. I suppose they're looking at that for the FW35. Lastly, the Williams sounded much louder than the other cars. It was the only one that made my uncomfortable through my earplugs. I don't know if that has something to do with last year's rules or not.





McLaren

Best Lap 1m18.861s Laps 37

I didn't see any of Jenson until the McLaren was ready for running again at about 14:20. First few runs were installation laps and the car sounded a bit off. Then came some longer runs and Jenson started to push. The car sounded much better by that stage. I guess he felt confident in the car. Was surprised to see a few lock-ups from him going into the hairpin. Jenson uses a very classic line through there. Very wide in and out. Seems to be later on the throttle at the exit.





Conclusion

Overall a fun day out. Not much can be drawn from my humble observations but I was glad to see such good reliability on day one. Only two cars stuck in the garage and only the Merc didn't appear again.

A few other shots for now.

These guys had FLIR (infrared) equipment pointed at the track. They were stationed at the last corner for most of the day, but moved to the back straight near the end. The seemed associated with Williams but I can't be sure. No idea what they were doing. Any ideas?



The Marussia gets a ride back to the pits.



The obligatory shot.

[jrg19]

Great stuff!

Are you back tomorrow?

[senna da silva]

Thanks PayasyouRace, much appreciated.

[PayasYouRace]

Won't be back tomorrow. It was a good day out and I don't feel it's worth the 75 min drive just to see a Mercedes.

[Owen]

Appreciate this, thanks PayasyouRace

[OO7]

Thanks PayasYouRace, nice work
Reading/listening to reports on car handling from those at the circuit is far more revealing than testing times.

[PEW]

Thanks PayAsYouRace, such a candid report reminds me why BBs exist.

[PayasYouRace]

Thanks guys. It was a fun day out and I'm glad I could share my experiences with you.

[jjcale]

Get the VIP ticket. Get to the main grandstand so you can see the garages. From the back-top of the stand you get a fantastic view of T3-5. Then it's a short walk to the area outside the final turn, but there's no seating there.

Ta

[onewingedangel]

Days highlights on Sky Sports F1 now.

[MortenF1]

Great to hear your thought, Papas!

[HoldenRT]

Thank you very much for those trackside observations and pictures. Very useful info there.. and great for those of us on the other side of the world who don't get a chance to attend tests. Great stuff.

[JRizzle86]

The chrome spot on their chassis where there used to be an aigo sticker?

If as has been says budget has had anything to do with them taking on Perez, maybe they do need to do a press run. Compare the number of sponsors on the Mac to the number on Red Bull. Plus, no more Merc support this year via free engines, this cuts their budget by millions.

Testing does not buy you sponsors.

[Treads]

The bolded bit is exactly what they were doing today. It is the only true way of testing reliability.

Thy weren't doing much when thy were in the garage all day while some cars put 70 laps.

Honestly why is this apparently such a controversial comment? Do you think Rosberg was happy to lose a full day?

[Treads]

Testing does not buy you sponsors.

And yet there have been many cases historically of just that?
May I refer you to the Prost AP04?
Anyway I was just playing devil's advocate and trying to make a joke. I really don't't believe this was a glory run.

[Lord Snooty]

Great shots and fantastic commentary! Much kudos and respect to PayAsYouRace!



p.s.

Anyone know what the FLIR guys were doing? Can't imagine they would be able to see warm / cold airflows but perhaps they could deduce airflow from which bits of the rear end wings / packaging showed most hot? What they then do with the info would be well beyond my meagre intellect though!

[ApexMouse]

Great shots and fantastic commentary! Much kudos and respect to PayAsYouRace!



p.s.

Anyone know what the FLIR guys were doing? Can't imagine they would be able to see warm / cold airflows but perhaps they could deduce airflow from which bits of the rear end wings / packaging showed most hot? What they then do with the info would be well beyond my meagre intellect though!

Temp Spreads on tyres for a start. And you could easily pick out what the exhaust gases are doing on a car from that range. The modern FLIR equipment is astounding.

[Mc_Silver]

I love trackside observations and photos. Hope there are many other people like you sharing his/her experience with us, thanks

Edited by Mc_Silver, 05 February 2013 - 22:17.

[Markn93]

Nice variety of cars -

[Ikebana]

Thanks for the shots, guys!

[fatd]

Another video

[midgrid]

Thanks for the photos and summary of your opinions, PayasYouRace! It's always fascinating to read this sort of thing when the times are comparatively meaningless.

[Zoetrope]

Another video

2:06 Grosjean

[Rikhart]

With a good infrared system, you can even see the exhaust tubing under the bodywork, like some german media guys were doing sometime ago. They will certainly be able to see every car´s exhaust plumes, where it goes, what vortices it creates, etc... Nice catch on that, im surprised only one team was doing that (at least openly).

[Rikhart]

2:06 Grosjean

The guy can´t wait to start breaking something

[olliek88]

2:06 Grosjean

Woah! He had just started to gather up the initial slide when the big ol' bump on the exit upset the car again!

[amarelo]

the equipment they were using look like this:

http://www.flir.com/.../view/?id=44260



Apparently they were doing some kind of thermal analysis?

[Lemans]

Edited by Lemans, 06 February 2013 - 02:57.

[V8 Fireworks]

btw, talking about trick coanda exhausts ... check out Caterhams innovative winglet in the ramp ... some protests maybe???

Does seem an aggressive interpretation.

If the winglet is outside the "cone" then by the letter it is OK.

However FIA could ban it for not complying with the intention of the regulation.

"Please sir, it is just a structural fin holding the bodywork together... It is very essential"

Edited by V8 Fireworks, 06 February 2013 - 03:28.

[tjkoyen]

Does seem an aggressive interpretation.

If the winglet is outside the "cone" then by the letter it is OK.

However FIA could ban it for not complying with the intention of the regulation.

"Please sir, it is just a structural fin holding the bodywork together... It is very essential"

I'd show up with a car that had a bunch of borderline illegal stuff like that and just hope they only caught half of them

[Sin]

These guys had FLIR (infrared) equipment pointed at the track. They were stationed at the last corner for most of the day, but moved to the back straight near the end. The seemed associated with Williams but I can't be sure. No idea what they were doing. Any ideas?

hunting ghosts maybe?



xD just being silly but thank you for the awesome review report intresting to read your first impressions

[krapmeister]

I'd show up with a car that had a bunch of borderline illegal stuff like that and just hope they only caught half of them

Apparently that's what RBR has been doing for years...

[V3TT3L]

hunting ghosts maybe?



xD just being silly but thank you for the awesome review report intresting to read your first impressions

My guess is gas analysis from the exhaust of all cars.
Then try to reproduce it in their cars.

RB9 for sure.

[fabr68]

Another video

Man, the Renault powered cars have some serious off-throttle exhaust blowing again. The sound is very revealing.

Edited by fabr68, 06 February 2013 - 05:07.

[Looserke]

the equipment they were using look like this:

http://www.flir.com/.../view/?id=44260



Apparently they were doing some kind of thermal analysis?

Sorry for OFF but when i look at that picture....

Edited by Looserke, 06 February 2013 - 07:26.

[Desdirodeabike]

Another video

Did that guy at 1:16 just use tampons for ear plugs??

[Gilles4Ever]

The Day 2 testing line-up at Jerez is as follows:

Red Bull Racing
Mark Webber

Scuderia Ferrari
Felipe Massa

McLaren
Sergio Pérez

Lotus F1 Team
Romain Grosjean

Mercedes AMG F1 Team
Lewis Hamilton

Sauber F1 Team
Nico Hülkenberg

Force India F1 Team
Morning: Paul di Resta
Afternoon: James Rossiter

Williams F1 Team (2012 car)
Pastor Maldonado

Scuderia Toro Rosso
Daniel Ricciardo

Caterham F1 Team
Giedo van der Garde

Marussia F1 Team
Max Chilton

Running time:
9am – 5pm

http://www.gpupdate....-day-2-line-up/

It seems that Marussia's new signing, Razia will be doing duty today

@radarguruf1: #F1 test, Jerez, day two: Another cold start, warming up later with continuous sunshine. Look out for the strengthening NW wind! Max 16c/61f

[boldhakka]

Very strange comments form Geosjean, showing his inexperience I think.