News 2017 Australian Grand Prix Melbourne, 24-26 March

[Notebook]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/formula1/38346759

Summary
 
Vettel wins after leapfrogging Hamilton in pits
 
Hamilton second, Bottas third
 
Grosjean, Palmer, Ericsson out
 
Ricciardo, Stroll, Alonso also retired

 

[tl8]

Massive error by the Merc strategy group. Hami wasn't that happy with them.

 

[fred18]

for a F1 fan and a huge Ferrari fan who woke up after 3 hours of sleep to see the race today is a beautiful day :yes:

 

[ADSWNJ]

Bit sad about the race. The cars looked gorgeous, but multiple drivers said that they cannot overtake due to the wake turbulence. E.g. HAM got stuck behind VER and that was the race, plus BOT could get close to HAM but could not challenge him.

I fear we have pretty cars but boring racing ahead this year.

'Grats to VET, and it's great to see the Scuderia Ferrari on top again. Commiserations to RIC at his home track - real shame they could not get the car back together again after the big off in Q3.

 

[indy91]

Yeah, the changes that were done for this season are not for the better.

Drivers and viewers complained about too much tire management going on, which prevents them from giving 100% all the time. And as a result of the more durable tires we now get 1 stop races. The best new rule of last year in my opinion, having 3 different types of compounds per race weekend, isn't all that relevant anymore when there is only one stop. So there won't be as many interesting strategies with different combination of tires, which is very unfortunate.

And even in the last few years there was always talk about the turbulent air caused by the aerodynamics of the cars. Instead of improving on this issue they made it worse now. But at least the cars break lap records. I can check an F1 statistics website for that.

But not everything has to be bad this season. We have two teams, Ferrari and Mercedes, that are more equally matched now than during the last few years, which should be pretty exciting. And I have high hopes that Ross Brawn will be able to lead Formula 1 back into the right direction, with better racing and a more affordable F1, that doesn't kill off so many smaller teams. Anything the new owners decide will take a few years to really come to fruition, but I am confident that things will get better.

 

[Urwumpe]

I fear we have pretty cars but boring racing ahead this year.

Give them a few days to get used to the new cars and things will change. Every bigger change to the rules resulted in some overly careful races initially.

 

[ADSWNJ]

Give them a few days to get used to the new cars and things will change. Every bigger change to the rules resulted in some overly careful races initially.

I hope you are right, but I fear not. Time will tell.

I'd like to have simpler wings throughout (take off all the winglets, etc, so the wings are more de-optimized), no DRS, and an automated close-action mode when under 2 seconds (i.e. let the engineers tune for clean and dirty air, and let the electronics select the right mode without the driver having to do anything).

 

[Urwumpe]

I'd like to have simpler wings throughout (take off all the winglets, etc, so the wings are more de-optimized), no DRS, and an automated close-action mode when under 2 seconds (i.e. let the engineers tune for clean and dirty air, and let the electronics select the right mode without the driver having to do anything).

Well, I disagree there - especially I think that any kind of automatic system or remote control is harmful for the competition. If this should be a race of robots, it wouldn't be the formula one anymore. The driver should be in control there, and if a driver is not good in exploiting such options, he should stick to what he can do better.

 

[ADSWNJ]

Well, I disagree there - especially I think that any kind of automatic system or remote control is harmful for the competition.

OK, interesting. So give the driver the responsibility to select his wing config mid-lap. We just don't need too many options, that's all. The 10+ changes/lap of bias, etc ... it's too much already.

 

[Urwumpe]

OK, interesting. So give the driver the responsibility to select his wing config mid-lap. We just don't need too many options, that's all. The 10+ changes/lap of bias, etc ... it's too much already.

Yes, some sort of. Maybe also allow some modification of the engine parameters (power vs range vs durability). But important is: The skills of the driver should stay deciding. I quite liked the Lupo series because all started in identical cars and you really saw the differences between good and bad drivers.

Same with the WRC, where the technical parameters are so similar of the cars, that only the robustness really matters.

 

[Lucy]

Sorry, but that's just another gimmick. I'm in favour of ditching the DRS and returning to more simplistic aero surfaces, though, because I think the cars are too "busy" now; the level of complexity is absurd! But it's all undone when they get within two seconds of the back end of another car, which is not good. Let's go back to ground effect cars and make that work safely, then they can all follow each other as close as they want without having a problem.