Red Bull Motorsports
F1
How much can you see from the cockpit of an F1 car? What the driver sees!
Formula 1 cars are usually viewed from the outside. Today, however, we will take a trip to their cockpit and check what drivers see while driving.
Small, cramped but safe
The cockpit of an F1 car is the driver's workplace, where he is exposed to various types of hazards, ranging from overloads resulting from acceleration, turning and braking, to potential serious injuries resulting from various types of accidents. This means that it is crucial for the health and safety of the competitor that the cockpit is, on the one hand, as well protected from external factors as possible, and on the other hand, that the driver's interior is as comfortable as possible. To achieve this, perfectly matched seats are used, created individually for each competitor and placed in the car in such a way that they have the greatest possible freedom of movement of their arms and legs, and at the same time that they are hidden as deep as possible in the car.
F1 cockpits have got busier over the years
© Jiří Šimeček/Red Bull Content Pool
Such a close fit means that when it is necessary to replace one driver with another, even making an individual seat is not enough to ensure complete comfort, because too wide a headrest or too close to the accelerator and brake pedals would effectively prevent correct and safe positioning in the cockpit. To sum up, no one in a given car will feel as comfortable as the specific driver for whom it was built. For this reason, for example, Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez could not just switch their cars. Each of them would have to bring at least their own seat and steering wheel, and it wouldn't give full comfort anyway.
Such a close fit means that when it is necessary to replace one driver with another, even making an individual seat is not enough to ensure complete comfort, because too wide a headrest or too close to the accelerator and brake pedals would effectively prevent correct and safe positioning in the cockpit. To sum up, no one in a given car will feel as comfortable as the specific driver for whom it was built. For this reason, for example, Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez could not just switch their cars. Each of them would have to bring at least their own seat and steering wheel, and it wouldn't give full comfort anyway.
Helmet
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The driver's head must be protected as much as possible, therefore a mandatory element of his outfit is to cover it. In the past, they were simple caps covering only the top of the head, later hard shells in a similar shape appeared. However, they all exposed the face, so they did not reduce visibility in any way. Full face helmets came into use in the 1970s and are still used, of course, after many modifications and improvements. Their modern versions have relatively small visors, the size of which is limited by the regulations. In addition, sponsor logos are often found on the upper part of the visor, which further reduce the field of vision. This means that when a helmeted driver gets into the car and closes the window, he will only be able to see properly forwards and sideways as long as the narrow headrest allows him to turn his head.
Mirrors in F1 - small but very important
© Getty Images / Red Bull Content Pool
Racers need mirrors to know what's going on behind them, but that's where the conflict of interest comes in. For drivers, it is a necessary aid to observe the car's surroundings, while for engineers it is an element disturbing the air stream flowing around the car. In order to give the former the best possible visibility and prevent the latter from excessively reducing the mirrors, their minimum size is also determined by the technical regulations.
What do you see and where should you look?
A competitor locked in a tight cage sees little. He can only look straight ahead and slightly upward; so he has no chance to see what is nearby below the level of his head. So he can't see the front wing, rival cars to the side and slightly behind, beyond the area visible in the mirrors, and even the place where he should stop on the starting grid. In the latter case, a colored line extends far beyond the field and shows the competitor where the front wheels should be. When it reaches it, he also hears a sound signal. In recent years, Formula 1 has allowed fans to enter the world of the drivers by installing cameras in their helmets. It is only from this perspective that you can see how difficult it is to see the details of the surroundings in a car speeding over 300 km / h and how little is needed to impale yourself on another car. F1 drivers are so perfectly trained that even in such conditions they are able to notice, for example, a leak in the car they are following or animals that have invaded the track.
When driving a car, each of us looks at the road in front of us. In the case of drivers moving around the track, however, the "road" reflexes should be slightly modified. First of all, you should look not at the bend you are approaching, but at the next one that you will be approaching in a moment. The places the driver is looking at are perfectly visible in one of the videos posted on the Internet, in which an F1 driver drives in a simulator with the eye-tracker turned on.
More F1 action
Driving an F1 car requires great skill and excellent reflexes. You need to make split-second decisions based on limited data and an incomplete picture. A mistake threatens at best a loss of position, and at worst - an accident, often very serious. We are sure that Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez will be able to deal with these difficulties efficiently, winning many more victories for Red Bull.
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