With
just one week to go until the Formula 1 season kicks off in anger in Melbourne,
I thought I'd take a look at some of the intriguing issues raised during a
chaotic off-season.
The era of
reliability is over (at least for now)
A funny thing happened shortly after the
turn of the century: the FIA introduced several rules in an attempt to both cut
costs and to reduce the dominance of Ferrari. Amongst the changes was a
requirement for each engine to last a full race weekend, which gradually
snowballed into lasting about four races – with gearboxes also being subject to
similar regulations. A surprising consequence of these rules was that the cars
became virtually bulletproof – something reflected by the FIA increasing the
number of places for which drivers can score points.
A throwback to last century is what we
can expect to see this season – at least for the first half of it – as teams
struggle for reliability. Make no mistake: there is not a single team that is
guaranteed of a race finish in Australia; whether you are Mercedes or Red Bull,
Ferrari or Marussia. Whilst the Renault-powered cars seem the most likely to
encounter mechanical problems early on, Mercedes – supposedly the favourites
for the opening weekend – experienced problems in the final couple of days in
the Bahrain test, proving that ‘no-one is safe’ so to speak.
With the power units (consisting of
engine, gearbox, battery and energy recovery systems [ERS]) taking hours to
replace, there is a high likelihood of cars missing either qualifying or the
race should they encounter problems on Saturday/Sunday morning. A further
consequence to keep an eye out for is that grid
penalties could be a common feature towards the end of this season as teams
struggle to keep within the allotted engines/gearboxes during the first half of
the season.
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| A good ol' engine failure Source: Sutton Images |
Just how far
behind are the Renault-powered cars?
Quite frankly, no-one knows. The issue
Renault are having is compounded by the fact the teams they supply have all had
to overcome individual issues: Lotus were in a state of limbo with their
finances, Toro Rosso changed to Renault engines from this season and Caterham
have traditionally struggled. Red Bull, meanwhile, have struggled from
packaging issues – a result of Adrian Newey’s obsessive approach to aerodynamics.
However, as Sky F1’s Ted Kravitz pointed out, did Red Bull not realize how the gap to their rivals seemed to be ever
increasing in the final third of last season? Surely the alarm bells must have
been ringing that the other teams had switched their attention to 2014 and the
mammoth technical changes? Both RBR and Lotus have said they are well
behind schedule but it would be a surprise to no-one if they were challenging
for podiums by mid-season – especially Red Bull. Renault’s situation is
distinctly similar to that of Chevrolet/Cosworth in the 2003 IndyCar season –
and it would be remiss of me not to mention the heroics which Sam Hornish, Jr.
performed in a terribly uncompetitive car.
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| A rare on-track sighting of the Lotus E22 Source: F1Fanatic |
‘This isn’t F1, the cars are too slow’
Wrong: this is exactly what Formula 1 is
all about – the pinnacle of motorsport technology. The FIA have been attempting
to reduce the speed of cars for decades – from originally banning turbos to
continually decreasing engine size, to the grooved-tyres decade, to the
prolific crackdown on aerodynamic efficiency. The new rules have been designed
to safeguard the sport’s future and make the technology more relevant – a
similar thing has happened with diesels and hybrids in endurance racing.
The testing at Bahrain has proved that
speed is not an issue – despite the cars still being in a somewhat embryonic
stage, the leading Mercedes-powered cars were less than a second off last year’s
pace in qualifying-trim. To further demonstrate how the FIA have succeeded in
slowing cars down, the Bahrain lap record still stands from its inaugural race
in 2004 (by a certain M. Schumacher – and we continue to pray for him). One
thing that is certain, however: several cars are hideous – most notably the
Caterham, Force India and Toro Rosso; although Caterham are supposedly looking
at opting for the Lotus ‘twin-tusk’ approach by the time the European season
begins.
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| The Hulk's excitement upon returning to the cockpit of the Force India was clear for all to see (apologies) Source: F1Fanatic |
‘Vettel can prove himself this season’
Again, I do not buy into this theory.
There has been a large amount of schadenfreude
attached to watching Sebastian Vettel in testing. He has nothing to prove. He is a four-time world champion, having
taken his first victory in a Toro Rosso at a soaking wet Monza – having also
put the car on pole-position. His talent is crystal clear. Yes, he has made
mistakes – and some fans might never forgive him for the events of Malaysia
2013 – but he also completely annihilated Mark Webber throughout their time as
team-mates and extracted the utmost from his machinery in 2011 and 2013
especially. It was simply magical watching him at the end of last season. You
need a bit of luck to be an F1 champion – you need to have the tools to win.
This has always been the case; from Fangio to Clark to Senna to Schumacher.
More than anything, however, you need to be a bloody good driver.
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| One of the more common sights of winter testing Source: Sutton Images |
McLaren heading in the right direction – but still in a state of flux
2014 was always going to be a year of
transition for McLaren, as the team from Woking await the arrival of Honda
engines next season. One key change has already been made: the hapless Martin Whitmarsh
has been sacked after a rather underwhelming five-year tenure as team
principal. It started with the ‘lie-gate’ fiasco at his first race in charge in
Australia 2009 and culminated with last year’s horrific season. While he should
be credited with turning the team’s hopes around in that 2009 season, he was
simply unable to rally his troops to match their rivals at Red Bull for the
next few seasons – most notably 2012, when they had the quickest car to start
and finish the season but somehow failed to capitalize on this. Eric Boullier
joins the team, having magnificently guided a Lotus team from the brink of
extinction back to a race-winning outfit in just four years. It is difficult to
predict how McLaren will approach this season; if they start poorly, Boullier
and co. will likely switch their focus onto their McLaren-Honda earlier than
their rivals.
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| Worryingly for McLaren, this sight became more and more common Source: SkyF1 |
And finally…
A few points in brief to finish…
- Marussia and Caterham simply must score points this season, there are no more excuses for them; Marussia have an especially good chance in the opening few events while the Renault cars struggle – and everyone in general fight to just finish the races.
- There’s a great deal of irony that Pastor Maldonado left Williams with his PDVSA millions looking for a more competitive car and the exact opposite has occurred; the Grove-based team have had a fantastic winter and look like genuine podium contenders at the moment (although, as I must stress, it is notoriously difficult to gauge pace from the often fickle pre-season tests; even in the face of mass rule changes, teams can still be ‘sandbagging’).
- It’s Fernando Alonso and Kimi Räikkönen at Ferrari – I just felt I needed a sentence about the Scuderia given it’s almost sacrilege to write a whole preview article without mentioning them!
- Force India have had a good winter and have a strong driver-pairing (again, see Williams for reasons to be cautious on testing) while rivals Sauber have had an up-and-down time.
- To stress a point from earlier, the early season reliability woes could cause grid penalties towards the end of the season.
- Double points at the final race is a simply ridiculous invention.
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| And the token Ferrari photo Source: F1Fanatic |
All views expressed
in this blog are my own and no copyright infringement is intended.
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