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The simulation generation


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#1 Rocket73

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 19:16

It struck me today that the new generation of drivers seem to be very accident prone and somewhat careless at the start of the race...

having watched a lot of grand prix (since 1980ish) AND played a ridiculous amount of sims it seems to me that the current carelessness and over-eagerness at the start of the race (it's all too easy to restart in a sim) from the rookies like grosjean, senna and even perez must have some sort of underlying cause...and the characteristics of sim racing fits the bill rather too well...lots of fast seemingly talented guys that seem to be very precarious come race day...

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#2 Jovanotti

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 19:18

What striked me again today was the amount of accidents like Senna/Vettel this season, i.e. a driver just sticking his nose in when it's apparent that he has lost the corner. I can't remember these incidents being so frequent in earlier years..?

#3 Myrvold

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 19:22

What striked me again today was the amount of accidents like Senna/Vettel this season, i.e. a driver just sticking his nose in when it's apparent that he has lost the corner. I can't remember these incidents being so frequent in earlier years..?


Well, none of those had "lost" the corner, even though, Vettel did take a pretty sharp turn.

#4 Rocket73

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 19:44

but when you look at grosjean's mistake in qualy..you have to think "what is going on here?" it's kind of inexplicable

#5 Rocket73

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 19:45

What striked me again today was the amount of accidents like Senna/Vettel this season, i.e. a driver just sticking his nose in when it's apparent that he has lost the corner. I can't remember these incidents being so frequent in earlier years..?


yup... exactly

#6 Bartel

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 19:49

Difference is safety. In the 80's if you messed around at the start there was a high chance youd die. These days with cars being super safe, tracks being super safe, and aero dynamcs/car speed being alot more important than those days, the start can sometimes win and lose you a race. Also, braking distances are alot shorter than they were in the 80's too which can amount for alot of the problem too. Id like to throw in 'mediocre' drivers too that arent there on pure talent but money they bring to teams, yes there has always been pay drivers but they were the minority, im not so sure anymore.

#7 ElDictatore

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 21:33

I don't think its down to this. Well, ok I only watch F1 since 98, but incidents with the top drivers didn't become more frequent. It's mostly due to that the pack being much closer together than it was before and therefore the accidents will happen more at the front and therefore get recognized more. In previous years accidents happend a lot more only at the back of the grid, but mostly didn't get any attention. Well that's just my opinion or how i perceive things, could be wrong though.

Edited by ElDictatore, 25 November 2012 - 21:33.


#8 Rocket73

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 21:47

maybe it is the safety thing... but when i see the first corner banzai attempts it just reminds me of my racing sim efforts...

#9 SenorSjon

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 21:51

The snowplough also sticks out more, so it is much easier hit in shunts. The driver can't see the damn thing, while it can see it's own tires. Make the wings fit between the tires again and I think you have less crashes.

#10 Jackmancer

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 21:57

What do you think? Limited testing, less time to prepare.

Also; more run-off areas, meaning mistakes get less punished.

#11 Tenmantaylor

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 22:02

I think it's a bit of an insult to racing sims. Most racing sims, especially realistic ones against online opponents, punish drivers who make these kind of start/lap 1 mistakes as you can't 'just start again' because your car would be damaged and you can't 'just restart' as everyone else is still racing. 'Console crash kid generation' would have been a better title.

#12 AlexS

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 22:09

What upsets more are the completely evitable accidents when it seems the driver lost the ability to imagine where the other driver position on track will be in next 0.x sec


#13 pingu666

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Posted 25 November 2012 - 22:42

seb caused his own crash with senna, imo

itll be poor side view, plus the upbringing of not leaving room for competitors until recently

#14 Dolph

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 00:22

It struck me today that the new generation of drivers seem to be very accident prone and somewhat careless at the start of the race...

having watched a lot of grand prix (since 1980ish) AND played a ridiculous amount of sims it seems to me that the current carelessness and over-eagerness at the start of the race (it's all too easy to restart in a sim) from the rookies like grosjean, senna and even perez must have some sort of underlying cause...and the characteristics of sim racing fits the bill rather too well...lots of fast seemingly talented guys that seem to be very precarious come race day...


I think its nonsense.

#15 Rocket73

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 03:35

I think it's a bit of an insult to racing sims. Most racing sims, especially realistic ones against online opponents, punish drivers who make these kind of start/lap 1 mistakes as you can't 'just start again' because your car would be damaged and you can't 'just restart' as everyone else is still racing. 'Console crash kid generation' would have been a better title.


yeah you can't restart the race when you are online,,,true but you can when you are practising endlessly of line

#16 wepmob2000

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 05:16


To be honest, as someone who's been watching since the start of the 1990's, I'm impressed at just how few collisions there are now, compared to what I remember. Yesterday's race seemed a bit of an anomaly in that it reminded me of how F1 used to be.... more knockabout and more incidents, although I'm not complaining, I totally enjoyed it! If there is one contributing factor to a possible lack of spatial awareness, its got to be the lack of visibility the drivers have now, it baffles me how they manage to drive at all. I've tried the various sims from the drivers POV and its almost impossible, I always end up switching to roll-bar POV......



#17 ClubmanGT

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 06:24

It's not sim racing. It's actual racing. GP2 has been dodgem cars for the better part of four years now and those drivers are graduating.

#18 Peter Perfect

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 07:32

It's not sim racing. It's actual racing. GP2 has been dodgem cars for the better part of four years now and those drivers are graduating.

Yeah, it does seem to be a trend filtering through.

Did anyone see the recent article on Autosport suggesting that a lack of close wheel-to-wheel experience (i.e. no wings) in lower formulae was to blame?

#19 Tenmantaylor

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 16:31

yeah you can't restart the race when you are online,,,true but you can when you are practising endlessly of line


You can't practice starting a race or racing with other real people offline so is a moot discussion to say someone can't race because they drive offline by themselves. Some people suggest no in season testing means young drivers don't have neough practice. Rubbish, you don't practice starts or real racing for position in testing. It's the difference between training in football and being 'match fit' You only get match fit playing matches, you only get to be a versed racer by racing.

I've raced sims online against others for many years and the type of driver you are referring to is what is known as a 'hotlapper', just endlessly trying to set fastest lap to set a WR. In controlled conditions they are fast but don't know how to race other people with any kind of racecraft. I agree Maldonado and Grosjean fit this mould very well. You'd think coming up through the feeder series they do that this type of behaviour would be beaten out of them. Obviously not. But don't blame racing sims, blame the real racing system.

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#20 hmm

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 18:24

I remember watching this race start wondering had they all forgot how to race during the winter:

http://www.formula1..../season/2002/5/

I don't think the race starts nowadays have more accidents than before but to be sure we should run the stats about it. It's a long winter coming so maybe someone will..


#21 Wlleiotl

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 18:38

id love to see some actual statistics on first lap incidents rather than this rubbish, i always thought drivers were better than i remember from watching in the 90s

#22 spacekid

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 18:40

I don't think sims have got anything to do with it, to be honest. All the guys in F1 have come up through the junior leagues, probably with about 15 years total experience in karting/F3/GP2 or similar. They've all had experience racing cars at close quarters.

I do though feel that too many kids without many seasons in the cars only 1 step down from F1 get dropped into cars too high up the grid for their skill levels. F1 should be the absolute pinacle of single seater racing, not somewhere for someone to turn up after only a year of GP2 and end up in a car expecting to qualify top 10 on the grid.

Basically I think more of these kids would benefit from a couple of seasons down the grid where the pressure is off a bit and they can perfect their F1 race craft. If they have speed it will still get noticed, but they can also learn that races are long and to give each other space.

And yes, the fact that GP2 drivers act like they are in bumper cars doesn't help. Its an entertaining series to watch, but I think a lot of bad habits are probably learnt there at the moment.

#23 Kucki

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 20:52

I think it's a bit of an insult to racing sims. Most racing sims, especially realistic ones against online opponents, punish drivers who make these kind of start/lap 1 mistakes as you can't 'just start again' because your car would be damaged and you can't 'just restart' as everyone else is still racing. 'Console crash kid generation' would have been a better title.



Indeed. The thread title is misleading. Try to do the type of contacts Vettel did in Turn 3 in a realistic Simulation like iRacing his suspension would be broken 9 out of 10 times. The race would have ended no chance to repair, big rating loss- Proper online racing in a racing simulation is pretty clean these days

Edited by Kucki, 26 November 2012 - 20:54.


#24 Juan Kerr

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 21:28

seb caused his own crash with senna, imo

itll be poor side view, plus the upbringing of not leaving room for competitors until recently

Exactly, if you're going for a championship in a single race who in their right mind is gonna pile into a corner from one line and cross onto the inside with all those cars around them? If he was playing Scalectrix he'd have gone up in the air! lol I can't believe Vettel took 2 out and his car survived. Lucky lucky boy.

Edited by Juan Kerr, 26 November 2012 - 21:28.


#25 Rocket73

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 22:11

You can't practice starting a race or racing with other real people offline so is a moot discussion to say someone can't race because they drive offline by themselves. Some people suggest no in season testing means young drivers don't have neough practice. Rubbish, you don't practice starts or real racing for position in testing. It's the difference between training in football and being 'match fit' You only get match fit playing matches, you only get to be a versed racer by racing.

I've raced sims online against others for many years and the type of driver you are referring to is what is known as a 'hotlapper', just endlessly trying to set fastest lap to set a WR. In controlled conditions they are fast but don't know how to race other people with any kind of racecraft. I agree Maldonado and Grosjean fit this mould very well. You'd think coming up through the feeder series they do that this type of behaviour would be beaten out of them. Obviously not. But don't blame racing sims, blame the real racing system.


yeah i suppose 'hotlapper' as you suggest is what i am thinking about...and btw I am not 'blaming' sims at all, i think they are great, just trying to understand the apparent lack of care and respect shown by certain drivers..

#26 Juan Kerr

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 22:12

That's because cars are safer now and more protected, ffs don't blame simulators because every driver loves them and can connect much better with their fans because of them.

#27 Rocket73

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 22:16

Indeed. The thread title is misleading. Try to do the type of contacts Vettel did in Turn 3 in a realistic Simulation like iRacing his suspension would be broken 9 out of 10 times. The race would have ended no chance to repair, big rating loss- Proper online racing in a racing simulation is pretty clean these days


interesting..havn't played them in a while..maybe i should get back on it :)

#28 Rocket73

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 22:17

That's because cars are safer now and more protected, ffs don't blame simulators because every driver loves them and can connect much better with their fans because of them.


Calm down...i am not trying to bash sims.

#29 rhukkas

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 22:18

It struck me today that the new generation of drivers seem to be very accident prone and somewhat careless at the start of the race...

having watched a lot of grand prix (since 1980ish) AND played a ridiculous amount of sims it seems to me that the current carelessness and over-eagerness at the start of the race (it's all too easy to restart in a sim) from the rookies like grosjean, senna and even perez must have some sort of underlying cause...and the characteristics of sim racing fits the bill rather too well...lots of fast seemingly talented guys that seem to be very precarious come race day...


top-level sim racers are some of the most cautious risk-averse drivers I've ever seen...

The reality is there are no less accidents nowadays... just more media and interenet hysteria

#30 Rocket73

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 22:20

top-level sim racers are some of the most cautious risk-averse drivers I've ever seen...

The reality is there are no less accidents nowadays... just more media and interenet hysteria


makes sense

#31 Longtimefan

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 22:21

It is the simulation generation, also none of 2013's drivers will have raced when a driver lost their life. So they think they are indestructible. Sad to say, but one day they will have a rude awakening.


#32 skidmarks

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Posted 26 November 2012 - 22:23

I wonder if part of it is that the engines, along with much of the cars (width, tire sizes, compounds etc) themselves have changed quite a bit, even in the last few years.

Didn't Shcumacher say something along the lines of the V8's having no "feeling to them" when compared to the older V10's after his first retirement? To him the engines either felt "on or off" rather than a gradual progression in the revs.

F1 engines these days remind me of motorcyle engines; an almost vertical torque progression that sort of flat lines for much of the range up to 18,000 revs.

#33 hmm

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Posted 28 November 2012 - 20:54

I went and took all race results from formula1.com to a database so that I could easily count different statistics from them.

Here area the amount of races where there were retirements due to "Accident" or "Collision" on first lap and the amount of total cars retiring on first lap because of accidents per year:


1980 | 3 | 8
1981 | 7 | 12
1982 | 7 | 15
1983 | 2 | 5
1984 | 7 | 16
1985 | 5 | 8
1986 | 8 | 13
1987 | 7 | 9
1988 | 4 | 4
1989 | 4 | 6
1990 | 5 | 10
1991 | 1 | 2
1992 | 4 | 12
1993 | 6 | 14
1994 | 6 | 25
1995 | 8 | 13
1996 | 5 | 12
1997 | 5 | 9
1998 | 2 | 9
1999 | 7 | 10
2000 | 5 | 14
2001 | 6 | 10
2002 | 1 | 8
2003 | 3 | 6
2004 | 5 | 12
2005 | 4 | 6
2006 | 9 | 17
2007 | 4 | 5
2008 | 5 | 11
2009 | 4 | 12
2010 | 8 | 17
2011 | 1 | 3
2012 | 6 | 11


I don't really see any trend in this, last year was exceptional as there was only one race (Monza) with first lap accidents resulting in retirements. 2002 has also just one but that was a real pileup in US GP.

The races with most first lap retirements (because of collision) are:

1994 Germany: 10
1973 Great Britain: 9
1950 Monaco: 9
2002 Australia: 8
1958 Indianapolis: 7
1966 Belgium: 7
1974 Monaco: 7
1998 Belgium: 7
2006 USA: 7

I don't claim my stats to be 100% correct and I don't know how accurate formula1.com results really are as they cover over 60 years. If people are interested I might start a new thread for all kind of meaningless statistics that can perhaps be picked from that data. After all, it's a long winter before the next race.


#34 bonneville

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Posted 28 November 2012 - 22:48

Your stats overlook the red flags and restarts on spare cars, which were rather common up until the late nineties.
In the last ten years, with the ban on spare cars, the use of the red flag has been less frequent, and replaced with safety cars.

In the days when spare cars were used, any accident during the first two laps could bring a red flag and restart the race for everyone - including those who might have been involved in the accident(s). Teams who had lost one or more cars in crashes were even pressuring the race direction to bring in a red flag so their drivers could jump to the spare car. It was not uncommon to see a retiring driver purposely stop on the racing line in order to maybe trigger a red flag situation so that he could rejoin the race.

There were 15 races which were red flagged on lap 1 or 2 between 1990 and 2000 !!! Only one race was stopped on lap 1 or 2 since then... Actually, the last race that was red flagged on lap 1 or 2 was the 2001 German GP. That was 11 years ago!
Full list of red flagged races here.

For example, your stat says:

The races with most first lap retirements (because of collision) are:

1994 Germany: 10
(...)
1998 Belgium: 7


But it overlooks the fact that 14 cars - yes 14 - were hit in the first lap chaos in Spa 1998. Only seven cars could not restart (some teams had only one spare car).

Edited by bonneville, 28 November 2012 - 23:07.