Quote:
Originally Posted by javadog
I think in F1, right now, it's 90% car and 10% driver. At that level, all the drivers have a lot of talent, regardless of whether they bring money or not. The driver deals are done long before a team knows anything about how well its car will do for the season, so the thought that they might use a better driver that brings less money to pull the car up in the rankings and get more money at the end of the year probably doesn't happen. I'd wager they've all thought of it, though.
Ocon is the reserve driver for Mercedes this year.
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This is the prevalent thinking from what I can tell. And yet engineers heavily rely on drivers' input to improve the set up on their car. I tend to think that the cars are more equal than we think. That doesn't reign true for the power package, especially the engine. Other than gearing, engineers have little control over that aspect. So the big HP teams will find themselves at the top half of the grid.
But the whole set up aspect is beyond daunting. If the engineer doesn't have the tools, e.g., huge data log from all races at all tracks in all weather conditions, tire data and aero data, and a driver that can tell 3 mm height adjustment regardless what the on board real time data shows, then said engineer is starting at a impossible deficit before FP1. And precious little time to catch up. Once a team lags, they have a exponential amount of data to find and catch up to the leaders which, of course would essentially mean outspending the leaders. Now that's a catch 22, for sure.
This is true in all forms of racing including NASCAR which is terribly much simpler than F1. So, even with a good F1 development driver (AKA reserve) who gets a scant few laps,
a driver is really an important part of the package.
Was McLaren unable to do better than virtually last place in spite of Alonso? That had to be well and truly the car. Ron Dennis and his spying kept them at pace and when that can of worms was exposed, McLaren didn't have enough proprietary engineering to prevail. That would appear to be the case to someone like me.
The best way to solve the driver vs. car issue is to way simplify these cars. By that I mean take away many of the variables. I certainly don't want to see F1 running a full fleet of Dalara's like INDY car, but if there are less things to adjust, then the possibility factor gets reduced whereas today the chassis setup possibilities are incomprehensible to almost anyone.
It was said that some 25 years ago, A.J. Foyt, while still a driver, got out of his Champ Car at Indy and smacked a suspicion arm with a hammer. If I understand the story, he changed the inside rear tire's toe by a fraction and the car went better. IIRC, this was well beyond Foyt's prime as a driver and also beyond his ability or desire to match the financial investment someone like Penske put into the endeavor.
The point being that while Penske's masterful crew would have systematically made minor adjustments and consulted their computers, Foyt was busy throwing his laptop across the pit and using his butt to adjust the car.
We need more butts and less voodoo adjustments in F1. They can still spend millions on the first few inches of the nose shape but they all run the exact same halo. Let's extend that idea to some of the other parts of the car and bring the driver more back into the equation. At least then we will know who the better drivers are.
All of racing talks about financial caps. This is an idea that will never work and keep racers happy. The public won't know the difference. No, the answer is not in spec cars, but cars with some specs while other aspects remain open to development. NASCAR got this all wrong and look at what has happened. I say that, and then look at the teams that have a top driver and the best engineering even with a spec car. What would seem to be a crude machine responds to a 1/2 lb of tire pressure.
So you can see why F1 is out of control and the last half of the grid will continue to change names and ownership while sucking up huge fortunes while we watch the same 8 cars parade at the front at a blistering pace so fast that passing is, well, not part of racing anymore.
The conclusion of this diatribe is to basically agree with
javadog with added thought.