The Official 2012 F1 Thread. Spoilers possible!

Very interesting.

BTW, my weak Google-fu shows that a F1 tire changer makes somewhere between $35,000 and $100,000 a year depending upon team and experience. I found one person, who claims to know a former F1 pit crew member, who says it's a burn-out job and that they often quit after 2-3 years. And that there's an endless supply of guys who want to take their place. No idea if any of this is true.

20+ years ago, when i was in college i desperately wanted to work for a race team. indy car, not f1. a race engineer came to campus for a talk and quickly disabused us of any notions of a glamorous career. miserable hours, endless travel, low pay, extremely narrow, focused tasks, etc.

and while he was pretty positive about the whole experience, he was also very frank about the toll that it would take at the higher levels of the sport.

this guy was then with a manufacturer but had worked on a team for several years prior to moving on.

GREAT ARTICLE ON TIRES

ESPN LINK

Force India trying side pod fins now

Interesting. I always read the comments, and the first one, naturally, says Pirelli is clueless. I think people forget that Pirelli was told to make the tires fragile, in order to produce the kind or racing we've been enjoying.

Regarding the importance of tire pressure; do the tires lose pressure in parc ferme overnight, and are teams allowed to pump air into them on race morning?

Tires have been getting all the attention this season. But it seems to me that the single biggest reason the field is wide open on race day is because of the prohibitions on exhaust gasses over the rear diffuser. That's a major design change, and major design changes often have a leveling effect, until the rich teams pull ahead again.

yup

So, yes. That's a big change.

I think we all suspected that Robert Kubica's days as an F1 driver were over.

But this is the first time I've seen it actually reported. Speed's website is reporting -- yes, this is second hand stuff -- that a veteran Swiss journalist says he believes the comeback is over. His evidence is slight -- the absence of fresh reports about Kubica's recovery.

But in the readers' comments there's something from a self-described surgeon which makes a great deal of sense to me. (I write as someone who badly cut my wrist as a child and who has suffered from a life-long lack of manual dexterity as a result.)

I believe that if I am honest I felt the same. I don't believe his racing days are over, but F1? I believe he also said he preferred rally over grand prix.

interesting......

I've wondered about that too.

As for the artificiality of it, I have mixed feelings. There's no denying that the tires are a factor in this season's unpredictability.

Any rules, by definition, introduce "artificiality". The only way to avoid it is to have a totally open formula and that has never been the case in the modern era (1950 onwards).

I do have some sympathy with the notion that micro-managing detracts from the idea of competition in its purest form and it may turn away the odd purist but F1 (like any other major "sport") is in the business of revenue-generation. It needs the widest possible audience to do so and as history has shown, that means the biggest possible grids with the smallest margin in performance between competitors.

Rules have always been tweaked. The move from slicks to grooved tyres was no more harmful to Bridgestone (despite the same arguments being proffered) than the current compound is for Pirelli.

Few people will be put-off buying Pirelli rubber, just as few people will expect their Renault Twingo to perform like a Red Bull, Lotus or Williams.

Monaco preparations

some classic Monaco shots

very cool

LINK

one for Ragin'

I agree to some extent but I think there's a lot more to it. The tires are to sensitive in my opinion which needs to be dialed back a little bit, however, it shows you who's car and which driver is using those tires most efficiently. They have always managed tire degradation in F1 but now its amplified.

If the rules didn't restrict them I'm sure all F1 teams would have wings that can change angle of attack (flat on straights, upright for braking and corners). The problem is the person following trying to setup a pass on the car in front is at a huge disadvantage because of the aero turbulence under braking and through corners. The car in front is working at optimal as the engineers designed it. So I do like the DRS because it gives the driver trying to make a pass an advantage on one single part of the track while hes still at a massive disadvantage everywhere else. It evens out the odds a little bit in my opinion. KERS is always used in strategic ways whether you're trying to pass someone or if someones trying to pass you. I would like to see them get more time per lap to use it so drivers don't need to be so conservative.

I do think they're getting to be to many restrictions in F1. When Formula 1 started the idea was there are no rules or restrictions. You built the fastest car you possibly could with the technology that you had to work with. I would love to see them open things up at least a little bit more.

There are a lot of other things that can be done to differentiate teams. Changes that wouldn't make the cars any faster than they are now. Open the rules up for different engine options like diesel (you might get Audi into F1), turbo, or rotary just to name a few. They don't refuel mid race so the more fuel efficient diesels will be lighter at the start of a race, turbos will most likely lag out of low speed corners but have the legs on faster sections. Let some teams use different transmissions or other drive-tran components. There are so many more aspects of F1 that can be opened up for other options and some could even be a lot cheaper while still being competitive.

Just like when KERS came out the teams could choose which direction they wanted to go. Give the teams an option whether they want to use the current aero setup or let them use more ground effects to get down force instead of wings.

Cost is an issue but all of the information and research is already out there... someone just needs to make an effort to put it into F1. Maybe it would be easier to do if the global economy every recovers.