F1 2023

[David Inc.]

F1 Academy is a junior program to try to open a pathway for women to get into F3 and beyond. The cars are F4 cars with 175hp. I think they're trying to keep the costs down to keep it running instead of the dead W series.

[yellowperil]

Soon as I saw Charles' helmet I knew he was going to be somewhere up front

It didn't really match his car, but.... nice helmet.

[J-Mac]

Originally Posted by astrochex

Crank it up https://twitter.com/paulmcg92/status/1713546438087438757?s=46&t=aVYUpRYzg-bv2n8am2mMAg

I was at the Grand Prix in Monza in 96. The sound of a full field of those cars, well you can guess the rest.

I moved to California in 98 and during the 2000s was at Laguna Seca for the F1 car demonstration, can’t remember which team but it was, but the car was a v10. Well the US folks there could not believe the sound, how loud just one car was. Seeing and hearing these cars in real time is unforgettable.

[cjh]

I watched the F1 Academy this morning and they all did pretty good except for the ones who had problem with the LF wheel locking up and probably creating a flat spot.
It looks like a different format for 2024, but still 15 cars and running support for some of the F1 races.

[Noah930]

Originally Posted by red 928

This morning I recorded what I thought was the F1 free practice 1.

Boy was I surprised that it was in fact the F1 academy
which is apparently F1's version of the WNBA and is better than
F2 and F3 which are based on old fashioned notions of
driver performance and talent.
No, the woke F1 academy obviously puts priority on gender and race.
Just as it should be.

F1 is finally starting to become a serious organization
with good leadership and a future!!!
Now they just need to get a some drivers who are transitioning.


I can't remember ever witnessing a successful organization
try so hard to commit suicide.

Well, that’s one thing you probably can’t pin on the F1’s head Saudi dude.

[astrochex]

COTA qualifying was fun.

[rockfan4]

Isn't the SAG strike still on? Why is Adam Driver on my TV promoting the Ferrari movie?

[dennis in se pa]

COTA - an American race. Why are the announcers squeaky voiced foreigners with horrible accents? They couldn’t get any qualified Americans? That speak actual English?

[oldE]

Dennis, try picking up the F1 feed. Even though David Coulthard is Scottish, you can understand him.
Max only won by 2 seconds. Oh yeah, his brakes were bad.

Best
Les

[yellowperil]

Well Max had to work for that one, could have been Lando or Ham with another lap or two. But he earned it.

Sorry to hear him being booed. Ham and Lando had a good fan base there. They worked hard too.

[Zeke]

2wice Max had to say, "Please stop talking...." He's becoming Kimi.

[J-Mac]

Originally Posted by Zeke

2wice Max had to say, "Please stop talking...." He's becoming Kimi.

Twice Max said “stop talking when I’m braking” Not Kimi in any way. If you’ve raced you’ll know braking involves all senses on full alert, including sound.

[Paul K]

Lewis & Charles disqualified.

https://www.crash.net/f1/news/1038965/1/hamilton-loses-podium-he-and-leclerc-excluded-plank-wear-breach?fbclid=IwAR1xwYYTZ9IiNUQumffLrwLenbq3Bfs5Mf uupkKTjxfHCxg7qJibtY7Qrzc_aem_AUnm7dDk1VJDivuK7gvB Dltgn2WGgG_iK5GTbBPt8ZtbUE-_Jjt-Y3NMMfCaH9j0ufc

What the…

[herr_oberst]

I guess that new floor isn't working the way Mercedes was hoping.

[Reg]

The track is bumpier as all get out. This is a shame.

[Jeff Higgins]

It's my understanding that the FIA only checks four cars at every race, selected completely at random, and that no one has been disqualified on this since the 1990's.

I would guess that this was a calculated risk, that the teams knew the cars were too low and just assumed they would not get caught. I would be surprised to learn that any team at this level would make such a "mistake". I wonder how much of a performance advantage they gained. Could Lewis have caught Lando without this advantage? Maybe George's performance answers that question.

[red 928]

Originally Posted by Noah930

Well, that’s one thing you probably can’t pin on the F1’s head Saudi dude.

Maybe. Maybe not.

here's an article from Aljazeera with more detail.

Women drivers race to break Formula 1’s male monopoly
With nearly half of Formula 1 fans now female, new initiatives aim to get women into the driving seat.

By Jessica Baldwin
Published On 4 Mar 2023
4 Mar 2023
Silverstone, England – As the Formula 1 season kicks off this weekend in Bahrain in front of a sell-out crowd, fans can expect to see blistering speeds, squealing tyres, sliding fast corners and daring overtaking.

What they won’t see is a female driver.

There has not been a woman driver in a Formula 1 race for more than 40 years. But that could be about to change.

With about 40 percent of F1 fans now female, the motorsport industry is making a concerted effort to ensure that at least one of the 20 drivers on the grid is female.

Formula 1 has put its clout behind the F1 Academy. On Wednesday, the organisation announced that the initiative for women drivers will be headed by Susie Wolff, former driver and wife of Toto Wolff, the CEO of the Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 team.

The F1 Academy will subsidise the budgets for 15 women who drive for five teams.

Another initiative is More Than Equal, a non-profit launched in June with the sole purpose of putting a woman on the podium.

More Than Equal will scout the world for talented young female drivers and then nurture them to success.

Founder Kate Beavan rejects the notion that women lack the strength to compete.

“Seventy-five women have been to space with all of its physical challenges, G-forces, with its technical challenges of understanding the technology behind it, and it is a highly competitive environment as a programme to get in to,” Beavan, a longtime Formula 1 executive, told Al Jazeera.

“So, I think that lays that argument to rest.”


No rules prevent women from competing in Formula 1 but the pipeline of young female drivers is a trickle and they face additional hurdles, including a lack of confidence.

“I always doubted myself. I never thought I could be there beating the guys. I think I definitely had a bit of intimidation or impostor syndrome which perhaps did stem from that,” said Jamie Chadwick, a driver for Williams Academy and three-time winner of the W Series, specifically for women drivers.

She said the confidence eventually came with “time, getting older in the sport, having great opportunities and great people supporting me and those opportunities have helped. But, honestly, it’s only come recently, in the last five or six years,” said the 24-year-old, who is now driving in the INDY NXT series in the United States.

Speaking to Al Jazeera at the Williams headquarters in Wantage, England, surrounded by dozens of F1 cars, Chadwick said her dream is “ultimately Formula 1”.

Another young driver with dreams of Formula 1 is Macie Hitter.

The 15-year-old has raced go-karts since she was eight, winning countless races and amassing a glittering collection of trophies on display at her home in Griston, England.

The schoolgirl doesn’t go to parties or shop with friends. For the last seven years, Hitter has been in the gym or on the track preparing for the next race. On race day, she’s faced an extra stumbling block – being female.

“When women come to the track the boys are very confused about why they are here because it’s a very male-dominated sport. When you arrive they’re like ‘is that a girl there?’ A lot of them do not want to be beaten by a girl. So, I’ve had some challenging weekends being taken off [the track],” she told Al Jazeera.

“But the more experience you get and the more you’re with the boys they realise you are there and they start to race with you, but it’s been tough.”

Macie Hitter, 15
Macie Hitter, 15, has raced go-karts since she was eight, winning countless races and amassing a collection of trophies [Jessica Baldwin/Al Jazeera]
The day Al Jazeera watched Hitter on a go-kart track in northern England, she was the fastest by far, topping 120km (74.5 miles) per hour in a machine just centimetres off the asphalt.

Despite a successful go-karting career, Hitter has struggled to find sponsorship – which is critical to make the step up to cars. Sponsors want to back winners and women aren’t seen on the podium.

“You don’t see a woman in F1 right now so I would say it is more difficult for a woman to get [sponsorship] but I am hoping that it is going to start becoming more frequent,’’ Hitter said.


Hitter may be a driver in the sights of More Than Equal.

Beavan said the organisation is doing research into why women drivers aren’t making it to Formula 1, or even F2, F3 or F4 where only a handful of women race. Once More Than Equal has the data, it will scout for talent.

Despite fans’ enthusiasm for a mixed grid, those involved in making it happen estimate it will be eight to nine years before a Formula 1 race includes a female driver.

“A very small proportion of the racing drivers in the world are female and we need to find where they are, what they are racing in, identify their racing abilities and pluck them and then develop their skills – whether that is physical, mental, race craft – and help drive them all the way up to Formula 1,” Beavan said on a grey day at Silverstone, home of the British Grand Prix.

Tickets to this season’s Grand Prix at Silverstone in July sold out in record time. Audiences for Formula 1 have skyrocketed in the last three years, thanks in no small part to the Netflix series Formula 1: Drive to Survive – a runaway hit during lockdown. That’s how Isabella Vittoria, 27, got hooked.

Vittoria, a marketing executive at Bumble, the online dating app, is a typical new fan: young, female, and engaging with Formula 1 on social media. Ahead of her upcoming marriage, she is celebrating her bachelorette party at the Barcelona Grand Prix with her sister, Alexa, and five female friends.

“I would love to see a woman driver in F1. It’s such a male-dominated sport, not just for the drivers, but also for the teams behind the scenes,” Vittoria said.

“I would love to see what a woman driver brings to the on-track dynamic.”

[Captain Ahab Jr]

Originally Posted by Jeff Higgins

It's my understanding that the FIA only checks four cars at every race, selected completely at random, and that no one has been disqualified on this since the 1990's.

I would guess that this was a calculated risk, that the teams knew the cars were too low and just assumed they would not get caught. I would be surprised to learn that any team at this level would make such a "mistake". I wonder how much of a performance advantage they gained. Could Lewis have caught Lando without this advantage? Maybe George's performance answers that question.

Plank has several 50mm legality through holes in prescribed positions, thickness is only measured around these holes

Thickness rule is simple plank has to be 10mm +/-1mm through out the race event

When designing the skids you are limited by a specified minimum area per skid, shape and position of skids is free

If you run nose down, more skids are needed to protect the front legality hole but these modern F1 car run faster flatter to the ground so skids are still biased towards the front but now the rear legality hole needs a little wear protection too

Mercedes and Ferrari are having to run a more aggressive on the limit set up to try and keep with RBR

Only mistake both teams made is they over stepped the limit, F1 is all about pushing all the limits

[URY914]

Captain,
Are the F1 rules public information? Online somewhere?

The level of detail you must live by is maddening, I assume.

[Reg]

Great info. Thank you, Captain!