Get past it

Sebastian Vettel cannot find a way past Massa.jpg

Ferrari.com

Get past it

by Matt Youson, Oct 2, 2009

After upheaval in bodywork regulations, 2009 was the season F1 fans were expecting to see overtaking return to the World Championship. It hasn’t – and maybe it was never going to. Williams technical director Sam Michael explains why…

So, Sam, what has changed with these new regulations?
The first thing is that the cars are much tidier, and one of the targets was to tidy the dirty wake behind the car. That’s definitely worked. There are fewer flips and curls because of the bodywork exclusion zones, and it has helped a lot. I genuinely think cars can follow one another much closer this year – but that’s a bit subjective.

Now, that doesn’t mean a lot of the fans, it only means something to strategy engineers. What means something to fans is watching cars physically overtake other cars. While there are some examples that suggest it has got better, there is still work to do. It’s one of those things that I don’t think you’ll solve with a single magic bullet. I think there are other things that will need to change.

So, what’s the next step?
Well, next year wheel fairings are disappearing. When we had the diffuser case in Paris four or five months ago, one of the things we found from our studies was that wheel fairings were massively damaging to the wake behind the car. So, I think it’s a good thing they’re going. I think it will tidy the wake up again and allow cars to follow even closer. To be honest that’s not the reason they’re being banned. They’re being banned on cost-grounds as they’re quite expensive little mechanisms to run. But I think it’s going to have a secondary effect of actually improving overtaking.

We’ve had several races now where obviously quicker cars haven’t been able to pass those in front. Designers might believe the new rules are working successfully, but armchair fans probably won’t. What would you say to them?
Well, the Overtaking Working Group, clearly by its name, was designed to improve overtaking. But you won’t get to the point where it’s easy, and I don’t think we want to anyway. I don’t think we want to have overtaking all the time, like they have in NASCAR, for example where the cars are drafting the whole race.

Getty Images

NASCAR isn’t false, but it is engineered to ensure the whole pack stays together all of the time. F1 has a technical side to it as well, it’s a big part of our sport and I think it’s something the fans also want. If you look at the things we do on the cars, we’re always trying to differentiate ourselves by doing a better technical job. It’s pretty hard to do that, and give the fans something like NASCAR.

If you want to be brutal about it, you could say to the fans, if you want NASCAR-style overtaking, go and watch NASCAR. It exists; but it isn’t Formula One. It doesn’t mean we don’t think we can improve what we offer. If the fans are angry because they think enough hasn’t been done, potentially they’re right and we need to keep working at it.

But you don’t think encouraging overtaking is purely the responsibility of chassis designers, do you?
I don’t. The Overtaking Working Group were tasked with working on the car, but I think it was a mistake to not address the issue of circuit design. It’s the most crucial factor in overtaking and it hasn’t been addressed yet. There is such a lack of interest from the people that matter in changing the Grand Prix circuits – and I just can’t understand why.

I’ll give you an example. We know that at a race in Barcelona, we won’t see any overtaking; but go to Montreal a few weeks later and we’ll see stacks. Those cars that can’t overtake in Barcelona are the same as the ones that can in Montreal – and that has to be because of the track layout. That should highlight immediately to anyone with common sense what the issue is.

Ferrari.com

Montreal’s great because it has slow-speed corners followed by long straights, followed by slow speed corners. Look at Barcelona: it’s just about the worst thing you could ever do for overtaking, because you have high-speed corners onto medium-length straights, followed by medium-speed corners – there’s never going to be any overtaking with that sort of layout.

I know it’s expensive to change circuits, but it’s also expensive to change racing cars. We’ve been saying this for 10 years and I think only now is there any momentum to look at it. The FIA is looking at setting up a group to study circuit design and how it relates to overtaking. I think it’s well overdue that something should be mandated for the circuits themselves.

I think the current situation is particularly disappointing because so many of the circuits are new. Obviously you’re never going to change a track like Monte Carlo: it is what it is; it’s always been like that and you simply have to accept you won’t see overtaking there.

But, if you design a new circuit – like Valencia or Shanghai – there is no reason at all why those tracks shouldn’t have a section that is perfect for overtaking. You need a slow speed corner – 50-60kph, followed a 1.2km straight, followed by another slow-speed corner. If you have that you’ll get overtaking.

To me it’s logical and obvious and I don’t understand why no one is doing it; I don’t understand why it’s all being left at the door of the chassis designers all of the time. Some of it justifiably will be – but it’s time for the circuit designers to step up to the plate and deliver as well.