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Safety Car Madness


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#1 bonjon1979a

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 14:42

Surely all the talk about radio messages being a turn off for fans pales into insignificance when you have to suspend racing for 15 minutes while a safety car drones around the track. The rules surrounding it are ridiculous, they used to let the lapped cars catch up to the pack at a quick speed but now they have to run to the delta it takes forever and is absolutely killing the sport. I can't understand why they haven't/don't sort this problem out.



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#2 FerrariV12

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:10

They should keep the backmarkers where they are. The gaps between cars have already been artificially shrunk, no need to make it even worse by getting rid of traffic between them, whether that's waving the cars around or putting them to the back as Brundle suggests. And that's before you even get to the problem of extending the safety car period waiting for them to catch up.



#3 August

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:11

F1 should introduce Le Mans-style yellow zones to reduce the use of the show car.



#4 pdac

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:12

I think the safety car should start off VERY slow and bunch the whole field up immediately behind it. This will give the maximum time for the marshals to clear the track before they come around. The safety car can then increase the speed before releasing them. There should be none of this unlapping stuff - just get on with the racing as quickly as possible.

 

Oh, and close the pits - no need for cars to pit now they have fuel to the end of the race.


Edited by pdac, 22 September 2014 - 15:15.


#5 Muppetmad

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:22

They should keep the backmarkers where they are. The gaps between cars have already been artificially shrunk, no need to make it even worse by getting rid of traffic between them, whether that's waving the cars around or putting them to the back as Brundle suggests. And that's before you even get to the problem of extending the safety car period waiting for them to catch up.

 

This is the sort of thing that happens when you leave the backmarkers where they are; they're trying so hard to get out of the way at the restarts that they become very hazardous and cause incidents. To keep the backmarkers in place would only add to the artificiality of the safety car by creating such mobile chicanes to navigate around at a restart that is already very intense as it is.



#6 KWSN - DSM

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:24

There should not be a safety car at all, since there is on they should let the backmarkers fall back through the field instead of having them catch up by running a full lap.

 

:cool:



#7 Nonesuch

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:40

F1 should introduce Le Mans-style yellow zones to reduce the use of the show car.

 

Reduce, yes. But the yellow zones cannot do something that the safety car is very effective at: bunch up the cars. Sometimes, such as yesterday, there is debris all over the track that needs to be removed. To do so, marshals need to walk on the racetrack. F1 drivers have shown time and time again that they do not care for yellow flags, which makes it extremely dangerous for marshals to be on track without a safety car.

 

It is very true that the safety car ruins a lot of the races in which it makes an appearance, but unfortunately it seems the only effective way to meet certain safety conditions. The FIA could, of course, stop the race entirely (red flag), but that brings up all sorts of other issues as well.



#8 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:43

F1 should introduce Le Mans-style yellow zones to reduce the use of the show car.

 

I agree, but even at Le Mans, you don't see men out on the track sweeping carbon fibre debris away from the racing line under a slow zone. That's only done under the SC, when you have decent gaps between SC queues. It would have to be the same for a Grand Prix.

 

I think they should tweak the procedure and the rules so that the full course caution can be declared, the flags and boards shown, the competitors limited to the deltas and the medical car deployed if needed (protected by white flags being shown to competitors as they come to pass the medical car), but the SC should wait at pit out for the leader and should only pick up the leader once he's had a chance to pit (and not when he hasn't, as at Hungary). If the leader pits, the SC should enter the track to ensure he won't miss the new leader when he comes around, but anyone who is not the leader should be allowed to pass the SC without having to be waved through. The current rules disrupt the race too much and are just overkill, in my book. They seem to be there to address risks of competitors hitting the medical car or bombing past the accident scene and causing further problems which, in my view, are already adequately addressed by the requirement to follow the deltas. If there's still a risk of drivers crashing under the SC deltas, fine, increase the delta times. But the FIA really ought to try to minimise factors that will interfere with the gaps between the cars before they've had a chance to pit, otherwise we'll keep having the situation we had in Hungary where the leading car or cars get screwed, or situations like Valencia 2010 where the leaders are laughing but P3 or P4 is screwed because the SC picks them up and won't let them past until the medical car has arrived at the accident scene.

 

I think they should also look at the flag signals so that we don't have the same flag used at the actual scene of the incident as is displayed all around the track to signal the full course caution. Maybe use purple flags with SC boards for full course caution, and keep the waved yellow for the incident area only? That way we could reasonably have a rule that competitors may overtake the medical car, and cars other than the leader can overtake the SC without being waved through, with the caveat that there should be no passing at all in the yellow-flag zone immediately around the scene of the incident. A higher SC delta time could also be imposed in that area if necessary, to protect those at the scene.

 

Just a few common sense proposals aimed at addressing risks in a proportionate way and keeping disruption to the race to a minumum. And of course, as soon as the track is clear, bring the SC in and go green, no messing about with the backmarkers, no stopping and starting again, just clear the track and start racing again.



#9 August

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:45

Reduce, yes. But the yellow zones cannot do something that the safety car is very effective at: bunch up the cars. Sometimes, such as yesterday, there is debris all over the track that needs to be removed. To do so, marshals need to walk on the racetrack. F1 drivers have shown time and time again that they do not care for yellow flags, which makes it extremely dangerous for marshals to be on track without a safety car.

 

It is very true that the safety car ruins a lot of the races in which it makes an appearance, but unfortunately it seems the only effective way to meet certain safety conditions. The FIA could, of course, stop the race entirely (red flag), but that brings up all sorts of other issues as well.

 

True, you cannot completely remove the SC. Basically:

Marshalls working outside the track: Yellow zone

Marshalls working oo the track: Safety Car

 

Now, if there are marshalls working on the runoff at the exit of a fast corner, there will be a SC. Yellow zone would be enough.



#10 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 15:55

 

This is the sort of thing that happens when you leave the backmarkers where they are; they're trying so hard to get out of the way at the restarts that they become very hazardous and cause incidents. To keep the backmarkers in place would only add to the artificiality of the safety car by creating such mobile chicanes to navigate around at a restart that is already very intense as it is.

 

And yet at Le Mans, you do a restart with the leaders driving massively fast works prototypes with very limited visibility, separated by massively slower GT cars driven by fat 50-year-old amateurs, and nothing ever happens. Why? Because in ACO rules racing, blue flags are advisory and the slower cars hold their line, and the prototype drivers behind expect the slower cars to hold their line.

 

One accident doesn't prove that we needed a regulation change anyway, and I think the risks of having backmarkers and leaders together are massively overblown even under the current blue flag rules, but if you want to address that risk the obvious solution is not to disrupt the race and keep the world waiting for an extra five minutes after the race could and should have been restarted, the obvious solution is to keep the blue flags in for two laps after the restart and say that the backmarkers should not move over. They shouldn't fight to keep the faster cars behind either, but they should hold their line and wait for the faster cars to make a proper move on them. That way you don't have the problem of them going off line and not being able to get back on again without causing problems, because the leaders are all desperate to force their way past and just expect the backmarkers to disappear, which might work in normal circumstances but clearly doesn't work on a restart.

 

If the leaders expect backmarkers to disappear, the answer is not to give them their wish, it's to ensure the rules reflect that the backmarkers are entitled to be on the track too and the leaders have a responsibility to overtake them properly.


Edited by redreni, 22 September 2014 - 16:02.


#11 Muppetmad

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 16:02

And yet at Le Mans, you do a restart with the leaders driving massively fast works prototypes with very limited visibility, separated by massively slower GT cars driven by fat 50-year-old amateurs, and nothing ever happens. Why? Because in ACO rules racing, blue flags are advisory and the slower cars hold their line, and the prototype drivers behind expect the slower cars to hold their line.

 

One accident doesn't prove that we needed a regulation change anyway, and I think the risks of having backmarkers and leaders together are massively overblown even under the current rules, but if you want to address that risk the obvious solution is not to disrupt the race and keep the world waiting for an extra five minutes after the race could and should have been restarted, the obvious solution is to keep the blue flags in for two laps after the restart and say that the backmarkers should not move over. They shouldn't fight to keep the faster cars behind either, but they should hold their line and wait for the faster cars to make a proper move on them. That way you don't have the problem of them going off line and not being able to get back on again without causing problems, because the leaders are all desperate to force their way past and just expect the backmarkers to disappear, which might work in normal circumstances but clearly doesn't work on a restart.

 

If the leaders expect backmarkers to disappear, the answer is not to give them their wish, it's to ensure the rules reflect that the backmarkers are entitled to be on the track too and the leaders have a responsibility to overtake them properly.

The bold is very true, and as you say, the attitude towards blue flags at restarts would need to change to keep the backmarkers in the pack.



#12 HeadFirst

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 16:58

I think the safety car should start off VERY slow and bunch the whole field up immediately behind it. This will give the maximum time for the marshals to clear the track before they come around. The safety car can then increase the speed before releasing them. There should be none of this unlapping stuff - just get on with the racing as quickly as possible.

 

Oh, and close the pits - no need for cars to pit now they have fuel to the end of the race.

 

Good point.


Edited by HeadFirst, 22 September 2014 - 16:59.


#13 noikeee

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:08

Can't see why lapped cars can't just drop back behind the SC. Yeah it'd pretty much kill your chances of a good race if you're in that position and basically get even further disadvantaged instead of the bonus they get now, but pro tip: don't get lapped.



#14 Roscoe

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:13

Indeed.  Just let the lapped cars slow down for 20 seconds whilst everyone goes by and drop to the back and don't count it as another lap down even though they technically will be.  And for the people moaning that they will do 1 less lap than everyone else, once you're lapped it's largely irrelevant (Queue people digging up rare examples of lapped cars finishing in the points).



#15 RubalSher

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:16

Arent standing restarts next year inherently addressing this issue in some manner whereby the lapped cars slot in their appropriate place on the grid?



#16 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:39

Indeed.  Just let the lapped cars slow down for 20 seconds whilst everyone goes by and drop to the back and don't count it as another lap down even though they technically will be.  And for the people moaning that they will do 1 less lap than everyone else, once you're lapped it's largely irrelevant (Queue people digging up rare examples of lapped cars finishing in the points).


You've anticipated the obvious objection, but can you deal with it? The fact that it might only happen rarely doesn't make it right. And you haven't explained why you think we need to move the lapped cars anywhere?

If car A is leading car B by a comfortable margin and has passed three backmarkers which car B has yet to pass, why isn't it grossly unfair to relieve car B of the task of passing those backmarkers before he can have a pop at car A?

#17 RubalSher

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:43

You've anticipated the obvious objection, but can you deal with it? The fact that it might only happen rarely doesn't make it right. And you haven't explained why you think we need to move the lapped cars anywhere?

If car A is leading car B by a comfortable margin and has passed three backmarkers which car B has yet to pass, why isn't it grossly unfair to relieve car B of the task of passing those backmarkers before he can have a pop at car A?

 

The current solution is unfair too. Why should a lapped car get a free pass on the leader?



#18 Spillage

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:46

I like Brundle's idea. The backmarkers are already a lap down, so drop them to the back of the field and then go racing. Sure, it means they'll never get their lap back, but that was the case anyway before we had this silly unlapping rule.

#19 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:46

Arent standing restarts next year inherently addressing this issue in some manner whereby the lapped cars slot in their appropriate place on the grid?


Well no, because they won't slot into their appropriate grid slot, they will be gifted nearly a full lap as now.

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#20 Mtom

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:49

On the backmarkers:

 

Radio announcement: On next finish straight behind SC all backmarkers (car xx, xx, xx, xx) pull to the left, and let the other cars pass, rejoin at the end of the pack.

There mission accomplished, elapsed time 30 sec.



#21 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:51

The current solution is unfair too. Why should a lapped car get a free pass on the leader?


It shouldn't. That's why I'm suggesting that the meddling with the running order really ought to be stopped.

#22 Peat

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:53

Is it beyond the wit of man to make the backmarkers drop to the back of the queue (on track or a pitlane drive through) and simply credit them a lap back on Timing & Scoring?



#23 ollebompa

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 17:54

Just red flag and then do a flying restart after one safety car lap.



#24 RubalSher

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 18:06

On the backmarkers:

 

Radio announcement: On next finish straight behind SC all backmarkers (car xx, xx, xx, xx) pull to the left, and let the other cars pass, rejoin at the end of the pack.

There mission accomplished, elapsed time 30 sec.

 

Much easier solution on similar lines. Just make them go through the pits and have the red lights on at the end of the pit lane till all other cars pass ahead.



#25 johnmhinds

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 18:08

Arent standing restarts next year inherently addressing this issue in some manner whereby the lapped cars slot in their appropriate place on the grid?

 

As far as I know they will still have to unlap themselves AND catch up to the back of the pack before the standing restart can happen.

 

So next years safety car periods could end up being even longer.  :well:



#26 Mtom

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 18:22

As far as I know they will still have to unlap themselves AND catch up to the back of the pack before the standing restart can happen.

 

So next years safety car periods could end up being even longer.  :well:

 

Actually shorter, they pass the SC, then the pack lines up on the grid, and they join at the end of their lap. While now they are going like 3-4-5 laps to catch up with the moving pack.



#27 917k

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 18:29

Despite all the hate for standing restarts, they should indeed solve all of the problems cited here.

 

There should be no unlapping, just cars pulling in to their designated grid spot.



#28 ExFlagMan

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 18:29

Actually shorter, they pass the SC, then the pack lines up on the grid, and they join at the end of their lap. While now they are going like 3-4-5 laps to catch up with the moving pack.

Probably not, as I cannot imagine the rest of the drivers being happy to sit for a couple of minutes with their tyres cooling down waiting for them to go round again and then being overtaken at the restart by the back-markers whose tyres will be up to temperature.

#29 Risil

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 18:32

[Singapore 2010 video]

 

This is the sort of thing that happens when you leave the backmarkers where they are; they're trying so hard to get out of the way at the restarts that they become very hazardous and cause incidents. To keep the backmarkers in place would only add to the artificiality of the safety car by creating such mobile chicanes to navigate around at a restart that is already very intense as it is.

 

Hamilton and Webber not being able to race each other without crashing isn't an argument for moving backmarkers out the way.

 

Opportunism and luck are essential to good racing and making drivers race their way through traffic provides both. That's the odd thing about DRS. It brings certainty and uniformity into things. If you are within x distance of driver in front at this point on the circuit, you are entitled to receive x mph boost on the straight. It's practically a universal human right. The solution ignored the philosophical dimension, i.e. What is racing? Why do we value some drivers as racers but not others? (You don't work it out with a spreadsheet detailing all the overtakes over the course of a season.) But it's such a commonsensical cats and dogs philosophy that most racing fans can spot its inappropriateness a mile off. But the engineers and lawyers at the FIA and FOTA missed it. Strangely enough.

 

But back to the original point. If you remove the lapped car between Hamilton and Webber, you haven't improved the racing because it's now a "purer" competition between the two drivers. Any more than you make football purer by taking out the midfielders and defenders and playing penalties instead. You've simplified it and cheapened it because you've removed the unexpected and unplanned-for.



#30 Dolph

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 18:41

And yet at Le Mans, you do a restart with the leaders driving massively fast works prototypes with very limited visibility, separated by massively slower GT cars driven by fat 50-year-old amateurs, and nothing ever happens. Why? Because in ACO rules racing, blue flags are advisory and the slower cars hold their line, and the prototype drivers behind expect the slower cars to hold their line.

 


And that would never work in F1 because F1 cars are close in performance whilst a prototype is faster than a GT car in braking, corner speed, acceleration and top speed.



#31 Risil

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 18:48

And that would never work in F1 because F1 cars are close in performance whilst a prototype is faster than a GT car in braking, corner speed, acceleration and top speed.

 

Given that the FIA has a thing for arbitrarily totally changing a rule for one weekend only, I'd love to see a race where backmarkers suddenly had to hold their line and the leaders had to overtake their way by.



#32 Prost1997T

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 19:18

Much easier solution on similar lines. Just make them go through the pits and have the red lights on at the end of the pit lane till all other cars pass ahead.

 

Sending them through the pits is a logical solution used elsewhere. Too bad the FIA and logic don't always go together...

 

As for closing the pits during an SC, that's more debatable - again, something that's been implemented in other series but to mixed responses. Someone will get screwed over by it either way because of varying strategies.



#33 Atreiu

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 19:24

As usual, the FIA makes it more complicated than necessary. The SC should simply pick up the leader and allow no unlapping. Period.



#34 Muppetmad

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 19:28

Hamilton and Webber not being able to race each other without crashing isn't an argument for moving backmarkers out the way.

 

...

 

But back to the original point. If you remove the lapped car between Hamilton and Webber, you haven't improved the racing because it's now a "purer" competition between the two drivers. Any more than you make football purer by taking out the midfielders and defenders and playing penalties instead. You've simplified it and cheapened it because you've removed the unexpected and unplanned-for.

I've been sat here for the past five minutes trying to think of ways to disagree with you, but I can't, so I'll just say I agree  ;) The idea of having backmarkers present in a restart situation makes me uncomfortable, but that is visceral rather than rational.



#35 johnmhinds

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 19:29

Despite all the hate for standing restarts, they should indeed solve all of the problems cited here.

There should be no unlapping, just cars pulling in to their designated grid spot.


Nope, all the news reports I've seen on next years standing restarts say that backmarkers will still be unlapping themselves.

#36 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 19:31

Is it beyond the wit of man to make the backmarkers drop to the back of the queue (on track or a pitlane drive through) and simply credit them a lap back on Timing & Scoring?

 

No, but then the timing and scoring would be objectively, factually wrong. It wouldn't look good when you get a situation that would be hammed up in the media like, for the sake of argument, Max Chilton coming 11th and losing out on the only opportunity he'll ever have to score points because, although he was on the lead lap when the SC came out, he was then "beaten" by someone who was lapped and got credited with an imaginary lap. "I did 60 laps and he only did 59, yet he gets the points and I leave with nothing", he'd say. And he'd be absolutely right.

 

Or what about if a Mercedes drops a lap and a half down on the field then does a Ctrl+Alt+Del and regains its usual blistering pace? If you credit it with a lap it hasn't done, it'll save a SC-lap's worth of fuel as well, so it will be able to run even quicker. If it then passes the field and "wins" despite not completing the full race distance and doing fewer laps than the rest of the field, F1 would be the laughing stock of the wider motorsporting world.

 

No, thanks. As an idea, it's not so much beyond the wit of man as witless and ill-thought through. So if you fax your idea to Whiting and put "from Bernie" at the bottom, it should be in place before Suzuka  ;) .


Edited by redreni, 22 September 2014 - 19:57.


#37 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 19:54

Actually shorter, they pass the SC, then the pack lines up on the grid, and they join at the end of their lap. While now they are going like 3-4-5 laps to catch up with the moving pack.

 

You mean leave the leader with his clutch and engine cooking until the last car makes up three quarters of a lap and forms up on the grid?

 

If the pack isn't formed up on the formation lap, standing starts tend not to go well, as this episode demonstrates. (This is a rather informative clip which helps to show why the start procedures are as tightly regimented as they now are, although I do wish James Hunt, who co-commentates in this clip, would climb off the fence and tell us what he really thinks about the standard of the race organisation!)

 

Next year, I doubt very much whether Whiting will be prepared to execute a standing start until the last car has caught the pack and the field has closed right up, so if we get a SC now it'll probably be best to wait until the pitstops have cycled through, take note of the race positions, then pop out and do 10 or 15 minutes of weeding or something.


Edited by redreni, 22 September 2014 - 19:59.


#38 maverick69

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 19:56

It's just the pulling the strings of the puppets.

 

For example: Car stuck in the middle of the track on the main straight in Hockenhiem........ No safety car.

 

A bit of C/F off the racing line.... along with all of the other **** and clag..... 7 laps of bollocks.....



#39 Risil

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 20:03

If the pack isn't formed up on the formation lap, standing starts tend not to go well, as this episode demonstrates. (This is a rather informative clip which helps to show why the start procedures are as tightly regimented as they now are, although I do wish James Hunt, who co-commentates in this clip, would climb off the fence and tell us what he really thinks about the standard of the race organisation!)

 

Jesus Christ!



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#40 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 20:17

And that would never work in F1 because F1 cars are close in performance whilst a prototype is faster than a GT car in braking, corner speed, acceleration and top speed.

 

I don't understand the objection. Are you saying the leaders would be unable to pass the backmarkers at a restart without blue flag enforcement? If so, I don't agree, except maybe at Monaco, although even there I can't see a backmarker bothering to actively block or to defend against a move into the chicane or a lunge at the hairpin or at Rascasse. And anyway, I'm only suggesting suspending the usual blue flag rules for two laps after a restart to avoid slower cars being compelled to go offline at non-ideal places for fear of getting a penalty if they wait, and then having to come back onto the racing line at greatly reduced speeds with cold, dirty tyres and causing problems for the cars behind. If the leaders can't pass in those two laps, they will get past after two laps when the blue flag rules come back in, by which point everything should be a bit less busy and everybody should at least have their temps and pressures up.

 

EDIT: Oh, and by the way, F1 had very similar blue flag rules to the ACO for the first 40-odd years of its existence, until the Irvine-Senna punch-up led to a rethink, and people still got lapped alright. And in WEC, cars in all classes still seem to be able to put laps on other cars in their own class without too much bother.


Edited by redreni, 22 September 2014 - 20:23.


#41 HuddersfieldTerrier1986

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 21:45

It's bad enough on some tracks where you lose a couple of laps while the lapped cars go round and we have to wait for them to catch the back of the pack, but with such a long track, long lap, slow laptime at Singapore it's more like 3-4 laps you lose. I say this everytime it happens, especially with Singapore. Just move the lapped cars out of the way and let them drop to the back or whatever, rather than wasting racing laps letting them not only unlap themselves, but go round slowly AND catch right up to the back of the pack.



#42 redreni

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 22:02

It's bad enough on some tracks where you lose a couple of laps while the lapped cars go round and we have to wait for them to catch the back of the pack, but with such a long track, long lap, slow laptime at Singapore it's more like 3-4 laps you lose. I say this everytime it happens, especially with Singapore. Just move the lapped cars out of the way and let them drop to the back or whatever, rather than wasting racing laps letting them not only unlap themselves, but go round slowly AND catch right up to the back of the pack.

 

I'm really sorry to take up so much space in the thread asking the same thing, but I notice a lot of posters, including regular posters who I know to be perfectly sensible, just assuming in their responses that it's better to change the running order to remove the backmarkers from their normal track position between the leading cars, without feeling the need to argue the point. I know it's what's done now, so there's a kind of inertia that creates a presumption in its favour, but it doesn't have to be this way and I'm actually really curious to know why people dislike the idea of going back to the rule we had from 1994-2010 (with a couple of years' break in the late 2000s), namely no meddling with the order?

 

In all the time we had that rule, I'm only aware of one instance where things got a bit hairy at the restart, which is the one everybody always goes on about from Singapore 2010 when Hamilton came together with Webber after pinching him at an apex, and even that accident and the other prang on the same lap weren't actually caused by backmarkers per se and were completely avoidable incidents.

 

So we have a system that's had 14 or 15 seasons of use and no directly attributable accidents, which is demonstrably fairer than changing the running order. Given that on every other similar issue (double points, standing restarts), there seems to be a clear majority in favour of having fair rules rather than rules that are designed artificially to enhance "the show", why are so many people opposed to fairer SC rules?



#43 Collombin

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 22:04

Jesus Christ!


It was fairly predictable which clip would be linked to, although I must admit not realising Zolder was in Austria.

#44 Risil

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 22:07

It was fairly predictable which clip would be linked to, although I must admit not realising Zolder was in Austria.

 

When it comes to wack startline procedures, my money was on Monza 1978. I have to confess either not having seen the live footage from the 1981 Belgian Grand Prix or not having seen it for a long time. However I have lived in Belgium so the shenanigans in the clip didn't come as a total surprise.

 

It's the way they all zoom past having completed the first lap, with marshals waving the cars to one side of the main straight evidently given no help from flagmen earlier around the lap. That's what's most terrifying.


Edited by Risil, 22 September 2014 - 22:09.


#45 Lights

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 22:13

This is the sort of thing that happens when you leave the backmarkers where they are; they're trying so hard to get out of the way at the restarts that they become very hazardous and cause incidents

 

Sure, and guns kill people.



#46 scheivlak

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 22:24

It was fairly predictable which clip would be linked to, although I must admit not realising Zolder was in Austria.

OT - I wonder how many people (outside our language area) know what 'Zolder' means in Dutch......



#47 Ricardo F1

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Posted 22 September 2014 - 22:25

 

 

This is the sort of thing that happens when you leave the backmarkers where they are; they're trying so hard to get out of the way at the restarts that they become very hazardous and cause incidents. To keep the backmarkers in place would only add to the artificiality of the safety car by creating such mobile chicanes to navigate around at a restart that is already very intense as it is.

I simply don't agree with this.  The driver behind is getting a free crack at the car in front - which he didn't have prior to the SC.  He would've had to clear the backmarkers before, why not now?  

 

That said before they did this I used to shout at the TV for the backmarkers to get the F*** out of the way when my driver was pushing to challenge the front car, so you can call me a complete hypocrit (coz I was shouting at the TV Sunday for the opposite reason!).  :)



#48 RubalSher

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Posted 23 September 2014 - 01:47

Sending them through the pits is a logical solution used elsewhere. Too bad the FIA and logic don't always go together...

 

As for closing the pits during an SC, that's more debatable - again, something that's been implemented in other series but to mixed responses. Someone will get screwed over by it either way because of varying strategies.

 

The only strategy calls we have now is for tyres and drivers who need a change of tyres pit as soon as the SC comes out. I am asking for the pit lane to be closed only when the SC asks for the lapped cars to go through the pits. So those wanting to change tyres wont be caught out and all teams would also be aware that the pit lane is going to close in a while so they can plan in advance if they need a tyre change or not.



#49 RubalSher

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Posted 23 September 2014 - 01:54

No, but then the timing and scoring would be objectively, factually wrong. 

 

The lapped cars will drop a lap against all unlapped cars. Why should they be given one lap less. Agreed it disadvantages the lapped cars more but it is the smallest of the evils in my opinion. In most cases we are talking Marussias and Caterhams who are anyway 5-6 seconds off the pace, and a lot of noise is being made for cars that are essentially slower than GP2 cars.



#50 Alfisti

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Posted 23 September 2014 - 02:39

They should keep the backmarkers where they are. The gaps between cars have already been artificially shrunk, no need to make it even worse by getting rid of traffic between them, whether that's waving the cars around or putting them to the back as Brundle suggests. And that's before you even get to the problem of extending the safety car period waiting for them to catch up.

 

I have been saying this for 15 years on this board and whilst some agree, way, way more get their undies in a knot when there's a lapped car between two front runners after a SC. 

 

It's stark raving mad IMHO, and black and white, there is no grey area or maybe you're right I am wrong, it's plain stupid.