Formula 1 Discussion - And favourite driver?

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GARY ANDERSON’S THEORY ON WHERE MERCEDES IS GOING WRONG​

The message coming out of Mercedes during 2022 pre-season Formula 1 testing has been clear: it’s in trouble, and its problems will take more than a week to fix. It can’t, therefore, be considered a contender for Bahrain Grand Prix victory.

We take a look at how the problems are manifesting themselves on track and what our data analysis suggests, then Gary Anderson gives his take on the corner Mercedes has been backed into.

WHERE MERCEDES IS LACKING​

Cynics will point out that last year Mercedes appeared to struggle in testing then still won the opener.

On that occasion, a temporary fix of dialling more understeer into the set-up to settle a wayward rear did enough to get Lewis Hamilton in range.

The team’s adamant no such easy options exist right now for problems focused mainly on severe porpoising.

That’s not to say Mercedes will be at the back. Far from it. A podium in Bahrain would still be no surprise. But it doesn’t look to have the pace of current benchmark Red Bull and Ferrari appears slightly quicker too.

“They’re just not – in this moment – in a position to compete with either of Red Bull or Ferrari,” said Mark Hughes on The Race F1 Podcast.

“It’s as simple as that. The porpoising is just too extreme to access all the downforce the car is capable of generating. It’s there, but it’s not useable. That’s very much the message coming out of the team.

“George Russell was adamant that, as things stand today, they are just not there. He’s confident they will unlock the potential of the car and somehow tame its behaviour without losing the downforce.

“But whether that can be done in time for the opening race next week is far from certain.”

Our data analysis suggests Mercedes is at its weakest in slower corners, with notably lower minimum speeds at Turns 8 and 10 than its main rivals on their best laps. That perhaps means the compromises it’s making to tone down the aggressive porpoising are leaving it short on mechanical grip and downforce.

It’s slightly slower than Red Bull at the end of all the straights, but faster than Ferrari approaching Turns 1 and 4 (elsewhere it’s equal to or just behind Ferrari in straightline terms). This could be down to different deployment strategies or fuel loads, though.

There are brighter spots on the data. The Mercedes is reasonable through Turn 4 and basically on the same pace as its main rivals through the Turn 6/7 esses heading towards the next tight section.

GARY ANDERSON’S VERDICT​

They’ve got genuine problems. It’s a difficult one to say to what level those problems go.
I don’t think they’re trying to run the car in the right window right now. They seem to have gone around the porpoising problems by making the car stiffer. Making the car stiffer then leads to more brake locking and a car that doesn’t ride the kerbs or bumps very well.

There are two or three ways of solving that problem. The best one is to solve the porpoising, obviously. Try to keep the downforce you’ve got and solve the porpoising, which is what I think Red Bull has achieved. Look at its car in the latter part of the final day in Bahrain – I would say it’s running more rake in the car than most others.

Through Turn 4 you can see the side of the car as it loads up and it doesn’t seem to be quite as near the ground as some of the other cars. It’s only a visual thing, but the Red Bull does ride the kerbs quite well. So it’s a compromise of car stiffness, aerodynamic philosophy and how you abuse the kerbs. And I think Red Bull has got the best package out of that.

I think Mercedes has gone the wrong direction to achieve it. It’s tried to keep the downforce levels that it gets out of the underfloor by just tightening the car up, running it stiff, running it low, keep it in one little working window.

And that’s really, really tough to do when the conditions are changing. And in Bahrain it was changing: you had sand on the track one minute, you had a lot of wind. You didn’t know where you really were. So in those conditions, I don’t think Mercedes has got a compliant enough car.

Whether it’s because the downforce is quite peaky and Red Bull has got a bigger operating window, or whether it’s because Mercedes is trying to run it in that peaky condition, I’m not quite sure. I’m sure they’ll work through the data and try to understand where they had their best moments and how they set the car up at that point in time. And then try to optimise that for next weekend.

It will be about who does the most homework. But the Red Bull to me at the moment looks like the better, faster, all-round driver confidence package.
 
It's going to be a tough development year for Merc if they are truly behind. Teams are restricted on wind tunnel and CFD (aerodynamic computer simulation) time.

The base time is currently 40 hours a week of each (it was 65 in the "turbo-hulybrid" era) but under the new regs they get a multiplier based on where they finished last season.

That means Merc as the reigning WCC get a 0.7 multiplier, or only 28 hours a week with those tools. Red Bull as runner up gets 0.75 (30 hours) and Ferrari as 3rd place get 0.8 (32 hours). Haas as 10th place gets 1.15 (46 hours).

In a year where past performance is virtually meaningless and aero is king again its going to be very tough for teams that did well last year that find themselves behind those that didn't do as well to catch up. It will normalise nect season though where the allowance will be based on the new cars (this season).
 
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Steiner has said the following about Merc:

"Exactly this concept was our first draft. We had it in the wind tunnel last July and already realized that it brings advantages in slow corners. As an overall package, however, we saw greater potential in wide sidepods."

Of course Merc has more/better resources to throw at the problem. Could be a bad start to the year, might only get 3rd in races till the updates come...
 
Coccxys said:
That means Merc as the reigning WCC get a 0.7 multiplier, or only 28 hours a week with those tools. Red Bull as runner up gets 0.75 (30 hours)
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Now what Christian said about caring more about the WDC championship makes a lot more sense
 
New Fag said:
Of course Merc has more/better resources to throw at the problem.
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I wouldn't be too certain, they have a good tunnel yes but the Ferrari one is regarded as probably the best which is what Haas use for their tunnel work. As far as CFD is concerned the number of flops of HPC they can use is restricted so its a game of optimisation of CFD software which again Haas use the ferrari HPC so probably a lot of overlap on the tools too.

Plus Merc probably used most of last season's allowance towards last season's development while Haas didn't do a thing to their potato of a car and used the full allowance towards this year.

McLaren and Aston have just built new tunnels but they're not online yet.

I'm not saying Haas are somehow so much better off than Merc more that it is more level than you think in that regard.
 
if mercs really are behind ill actually be excited to watch Hamilton because we really havent seen him do anything recently but pilot his cruise missile of a car around at the front. if hes really as good as the media says he is it will be fun to see him push the leaders/top mid fielders in an less competitive car.
 
His record in underperformed cars is less that stellar, including many seasons losing to his team mate on points, making lots of really dumb errors and being a little bitch boy about everything.

It will definitely be interesting to see if he's matured, though I doubt the media tounging his arsehole for the past 7 years and so much believing his own hype will have done much for that.
 
No doubt he's one of the greats, and to be honest no driver will win in the 3rd fastest car (Schumi never really had a title win in a bad car, neither Vettel), but I think Lewis will decline now. He's the last driver of his generation still in a top team and he's not getting any younger. These past few years he's gotten clumsy. The young guns are going to get faster and he'll get slower from here. As for GOAT, that is impossible. Its a pointless discussion of circlejerking your favorite drivers.
 
I think Merc have pulled a blinder. Run the wide sidepods at power tracks and the narrow ones at handling tracks. Even if they don't do that, they have the widepods to fall back on if the nopods don't work.
 
Elbe said:
Lewis Hamilton-Larbalestier

I sense pronouns in Lewis' future.
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If he does change his pronouns and suddenly stops being at the top, we can look forward to a lot of hilarious "women can't drive" memes.
Weeb Slinger said:
"And it's Larbleton and Verstappen almost neck and neck as they enter the Nouvelle Chicane, and it's Hamlestier attempting to go around the outside..."
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Larbleton and Hamlestier will now enter my vernacular.
Coccxys said:
Haas didn't do a thing to their potato of a car and used the full allowance towards this year.
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Which was an amazingly smart idea tbh. Two rookie drivers, limited resources, just writing off 2021 in favor of this season might actually pan out. If they suddenly find themselves in the low mid-field rather than pure backmarkers, I will cheer and tip my hat at their genius. I'd celebrate a single point in a race under normal conditions like it was a Vettel podium.
UrinatingBrady said:
As for GOAT, that is impossible. Its a pointless discussion of circlejerking your favorite drivers.
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I mean, that's cute and all, but deep down, we all know the only TRUE and HONEST GOAT is ---Yuji Ide---.
Lone Dogma said:
I think Merc have pulled a blinder. Run the wide sidepods at power tracks and the narrow ones at handling tracks. Even if they don't do that, they have the widepods to fall back on if the nopods don't work.
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Can they even do that? I don't think
But even if they are allowed to completely change their car like that from race to race, it would be the most ridiculous and bad decision anyone could ever come up with.

They are running at a cost-cap with limits to windtunnel usage and so on. Trying to optimize one completely new design under such conditions is hard. Optimizing two is outright impossible. And then they'd have to pay the upkeep of both designs in parallel.

Imagine Merc running out of no-pod bodies and being stuck with their widepod design for a couple of races where that design sucks balls by the end of the season.

Nah, as fascinating as that idea is, I doubt that's what they do. If it was that easy, they could have run low-rake and high-rakesetups the last couple seasons the same way.
 
RomanesEuntDomus said:
If he does change his pronouns and suddenly stops being at the top, we can look forward to a lot of hilarious "women can't drive" memes.
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Louise Hamilton-Larbalestier will fully redeem herself if she becomes the first black True And Honest female driver in the W Series.
BTW when looking up whether or not the W Series ever had a black woman driver I've found this negress (a). What a fantastic read and photo :story:
 
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Hard Toothbrush said:
Louise Hamilton-Larbalestier will fully redeem herself if she becomes the first black True And Honest female driver in the W Series.
BTW when looking up whether or not the W Series ever had a black woman driver I've found this negress. What a fantastic read and photo :story:
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Her dad's a fucking treat too.

I also love that it's one of those wonderful unicorns: a Wikipedia article written by someone with a (justifiable) axe to grind but the jannies haven't even noticed yet.
 
first part of last year season mercedes was getting fucking trashed and the only races they won was becuase
1.- the fia awarded it to them in bahrein
2.- rbr fucked their strategy

mercedes came back because they keep fucking crashing into verstappen
 
blablabla said:
first part of last year season mercedes was getting fucking trashed and the only races they won was becuase
1.- the fia awarded it to them in bahrein
2.- rbr fucked their strategy

mercedes came back because they keep fucking crashing into verstappen
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In Hungary, Bottas crashed into Norris and they took out Verstappen and Perez. If he had directly crashed into Verstappen, I would never in a million years believe that it was an accident, especially after Silverstone. The way it panned out, I am willing to believe that it was an accident, cause no one could plan for a chain reaction like that.

RBR had great strategies throughout the season, but the Mercedes just became unbeatable towards the end. I do wonder how they got that much more performance out of their car all of a sudden. But I hope that they wasted precious resources and time to achieve that, which they now lack in their 2022 design.

It would be all too poetic, if they went all in last season, missed the mark with Hamilton and now suffered a similar fate this year. Mercedes must be taken down, they are now sitting at an almost unbroken streak of a decade of constructor's titles.
 
The absolute worst possible outcome fro liberty and F1 in general would be that merc were sandbagging and they suddenly both pop up in the top 4 come Saturday. We're all fresh off 7 years of absolute dominance, if the rules change has done nothing to stop that I can see a lot of people abandoning the sport. Hell I've watched every season of F1 since I can remember and I would probably reconsider watching if that history repeats.
 
Coccxys said:
The absolute worst possible outcome fro liberty and F1 in general would be that merc were sandbagging and they suddenly both pop up in the top 4 come Saturday.
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I wouldn't be at all surprised if Merc was sandbagging. I guess if the porpoising magically disappears this weekend we'll know for sure.
 
Coccxys said:
The absolute worst possible outcome fro liberty and F1 in general would be that merc were sandbagging and they suddenly both pop up in the top 4 come Saturday. We're all fresh off 7 years of absolute dominance, if the rules change has done nothing to stop that I can see a lot of people abandoning the sport. Hell I've watched every season of F1 since I can remember and I would probably reconsider watching if that history repeats.
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If Mercedes' streak of dominance doesn't end this season, F1 will be dead to me for at least a couple years. It's not just that it's boring as fuck to watch the same team win barely challenged by anyone over and over, but the fact that they have the prissiest primadonna cunt for a driver is making it even worse. Russel might turn out the same.
I, and many others, want to see them humbled.

At least last seasone was a banger in terms of the driver's title, but Merc still managed to cling on to their insane speed. RB had to sacrifice Perez a couple of times to give Max a shot at the title, while Mercedes was still performing rather well with both cars most of the time.

I am willing to give this season a few races in case Mercedes ends up dominating in the first ones, but damn... if they manage to lead the pack like in the past, it's time to move on for me for some time. Here's to hoping Merc just got something so fundamentally important wrong, that their car turns out to be a deadend. Wouldn't it be nice if they have to start from scratch for next year while every other team just refines their current design and thus enjoy a rather significant advantage over Mercedes for next year as well?

Man, I want to see Mercedes fail during Hamilton's time, just so I can see what kind of driver he actually is, once the chips are down and he can't just slam his car on pole every weekend.
 
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