Podcast: Missed Apex
Published Date:
Tue, 17 Oct 2023 21:42:37 GMT
Duration:
1:08:30
Explicit:
False
Guests:
MP3 Audio:
Please note that the summary is generated based on the transcript and may not capture all the nuances or details discussed in the podcast episode.
It’s a Techtime special as Trumpets is joined by Matthew Somerfield, technical editor at Motorsport.Com as they get busy explaining all the complicated words they use . From aero concepts to tyre toe and camber (not a cheese) to who is going to win next season’s testing, no CFD testing restriction gets exceeded in this, the latest episode of Missed Apex Podcast.
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**Navigating the Technical Complexities of Formula One: A Comprehensive Discussion with Matthew Somerfield**
In this episode of Missed Apex Podcast, host Matt Trumpets delves into the intricate world of Formula One technology with special guest Matthew Somerfield, technical editor at Motorsport.com. The discussion explores various technical concepts, including aero concepts, tire toe and camber, and predictions for the upcoming 2024 season.
1. **Whole Car Aero Concept:**
- Definition: Whole car aero concept refers to the overall aerodynamic design philosophy adopted by a team for their Formula One car.
- Significance: At the start of a new regulation set, teams explore various aero concepts to optimize performance. These concepts can range from side pod designs to suspension layouts.
- Factors Influencing Concept Choice:
- Circuit characteristics, such as high-speed straights or low-speed corners, can influence the choice of aero concept.
- Power unit efficiency and energy deployment strategies also play a role in determining the optimal aero concept.
2. **Floor Design and Spy Photography:**
- Importance of Floor Design: The underbody performance of a Formula One car, particularly the floor design, has become a key differentiator in recent seasons.
- Spy Photography: Teams often engage in spy photography to gain insights into their rivals' floor designs and aerodynamic innovations.
- Limited Usefulness of Photographs: While photographs can provide valuable information, teams can only glean so much from static images.
- Data Acquisition and CFD Analysis: Teams rely on data acquisition and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis to fully understand and optimize their floor designs.
3. **Tire Toe and Camber:**
- Toe and Camber Explained:
- Toe refers to the angle at which the tires point in or out relative to the car's centerline.
- Camber refers to the angle at which the tires tilt inward or outward from the vertical.
- Impact on Performance:
- Toe and camber settings affect the tire's contact patch with the road surface, influencing grip, tire wear, and overall handling.
- Teams fine-tune these settings to optimize tire performance for specific track conditions and car setups.
4. **McLaren's Resurgence and Mercedes' Challenges:**
- McLaren's Strong Performance:
- McLaren has made significant progress in the 2023 season, closing the gap to the top teams and challenging for podium finishes.
- The team's aerodynamic updates, particularly the adoption of a Red Bull-inspired side pod design, have contributed to their improved performance.
- Mercedes' Struggles:
- Mercedes has faced challenges with their W14 car, which has been dubbed a "Franken car" due to its hybrid design elements.
- The team started the season with a zero-pod concept but later shifted to a more conventional side pod design due to performance issues.
- Mercedes is working on a parallel development plan for 2024, aiming to converge their design philosophy with that of McLaren and Red Bull.
5. **Predictions for the 2024 Season:**
- Uncertainties:
- Predicting the outcome of the 2024 season is challenging due to the ongoing development of all teams' cars.
- Teams may introduce significant changes to their designs during the off-season, making it difficult to make accurate predictions.
- Potential Contenders:
- McLaren and Mercedes are expected to make further progress and challenge Red Bull for the championship in 2024.
- Ferrari remains a contender, but their history of strategic errors and reliability issues raises questions about their ability to sustain a title challenge.
- Red Bull, with their current dominance and strong development capabilities, is a formidable opponent for the upcoming season.
Overall, the podcast episode provides an informative and engaging discussion on various technical aspects of Formula One, offering insights into the complexities of car design, tire performance, and the competitive dynamics between teams. **Missed Apex Podcast Episode Transcript Summary**
**Hosts:** Matt Trumpets, Matthew Somerfield
**Key Discussion Points:**
* Technical intricacies and jargon used in Formula One racing
* Detailed analysis of aerodynamic concepts, tire toe and camber, and predictions for the upcoming testing season
**In-Depth Summary:**
1. **Technical Jargon Demystified:**
- The podcast aims to explain complex technical terms and concepts used in Formula One racing.
- Hosts Matt Trumpets and Matthew Somerfield provide insightful explanations and engage in lively discussions to simplify these concepts for listeners.
2. **Aerodynamic Insights:**
- The episode delves into the world of aerodynamics, focusing on aspects like aero-elasticity, front wing and rear wing designs, and their impact on car performance.
- Technical directives issued by the FIA to address issues related to bending and flexing of aerodynamic components are analyzed.
- The impact of these directives on teams like Red Bull, Aston Martin, and McLaren is discussed.
3. **Aston Martin's Performance Struggles:**
- The podcast explores the reasons behind Aston Martin's loss of performance during the season.
- Factors such as development cul-de-sacs, U-turns on design decisions, and the team's pursuit of the "water slide" concept are examined.
- The impact of these issues on Aston Martin's overall performance is analyzed.
4. **Pushrod vs. Pullrod Suspension Systems:**
- The episode compares the advantages and disadvantages of pushrod and pullrod suspension systems in Formula One cars.
- The discussion highlights the trade-offs teams face in terms of weight distribution, packaging, and aerodynamic efficiency.
- The impact of these suspension systems on car stability and overall performance is analyzed.
5. **Haas's Major Upgrade and Ferrari Connection:**
- The podcast discusses Haas's significant upgrade package for the Circuit of the Americas race.
- The team's decision to rent a special garage to expedite the build process is examined.
- The potential impact of the upgrade on Haas's performance is analyzed.
- The question of whether Haas is moving away from its reliance on Ferrari components and taking a more independent design direction is raised.
6. **Technical Innovations and Future Outlook:**
- The episode concludes with a brief discussion about the potential for further technical innovations in Formula One.
- The hosts speculate on areas where teams might focus their development efforts in the future.
- The importance of finding marginal gains and pushing the boundaries of performance is emphasized.
**Overall, the podcast provides an informative and engaging exploration of various technical aspects of Formula One racing, offering insights into the challenges and complexities faced by teams in their pursuit of performance and success.** # Missed Apex Podcast: Tech Time Special
## Summary:
* **Intro:** Hosts Matt Trumpets and Matthew Somerfield discuss the complexities of technical terms used in Formula One racing and how they will simplify these concepts for listeners.
* **Main Discussion:**
* **Aero Concepts:**
* Somerfield explains the significance of aerodynamics in F1, particularly the role of the front and rear wings in generating downforce.
* He emphasizes the importance of finding a balance between downforce and drag to optimize car performance.
* **Tire Toe and Camber:**
* Somerfield clarifies the difference between tire toe and camber, which are crucial factors in optimizing tire contact with the track surface.
* He explains how these adjustments can affect tire wear and overall car handling.
* **2024 Car Development:**
* Somerfield sheds light on the upcoming 2024 car regulations, which will bring significant changes to the design and performance of F1 cars.
* He mentions that teams are already working on developing these new cars, focusing on areas that will be affected by the regulation changes.
* **Circuit-Specific Updates:**
* Somerfield discusses the practice of teams bringing circuit-specific updates to improve car performance on certain tracks.
* He highlights that these updates are designed to optimize downforce and drag levels for specific circuit characteristics.
* **McLaren's Use of Recycled Carbon Fiber:**
* Somerfield acknowledges McLaren's efforts in utilizing recycled carbon fiber in their car components.
* He explains that this initiative aims to reduce the environmental footprint of the team and potentially lead to cost savings.
* **Energy Deployment and Tire Degradation:**
* Somerfield addresses Ferrari's recent comments about improving tire degradation by optimizing energy deployment.
* He explains the relationship between energy deployment and traction, suggesting that Ferrari may have found a better way to manage energy usage, resulting in reduced tire wear.
* **Conclusion:**
* Trumpets and Somerfield wrap up the discussion by emphasizing the importance of understanding technical concepts in F1 to appreciate the intricacies of the sport.
* They encourage listeners to engage with the podcast and ask questions about any technical aspects they find confusing.
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[01:30.960 -> 01:34.360] You are listening to Missed Apex Podcast.
[01:34.360 -> 01:43.840] We live F1.
[01:43.840 -> 01:46.600] You are listening to Missed Apex Podcast.
[01:46.600 -> 01:51.680] I'm your host Matt Trumpets and welcome to Tech Time with Summers F1.
[01:51.680 -> 01:55.320] And we have none other than that story denizen of the tech team.
[01:55.320 -> 02:02.040] That's right, Matthew Summerfield, also known as Summers F1, who's technical editor at Motorsport.com.
[02:02.040 -> 02:06.960] He's come up for air just long enough to share some wisdom with us.
[02:06.960 -> 02:10.980] But before we get started, I do have to remind you we are an independent podcast produced
[02:10.980 -> 02:15.000] in the podcasting shed with the kind permission of our better halves. We aim to bring you
[02:15.000 -> 02:20.200] a race review before your Monday morning commute. Might be wrong, but we're first. And we're
[02:20.200 -> 02:25.640] definitely first because it is Wednesday. Tuesday.
[02:26.760 -> 02:27.040] It's Wednesday somewhere.
[02:27.880 -> 02:27.920] Australia.
[02:29.320 -> 02:30.440] Steve, it's Wednesday there. What's happening in the future?
[02:31.040 -> 02:33.120] Uh, Summers, welcome back.
[02:33.120 -> 02:34.400] It's so good to see you.
[02:34.920 -> 02:36.040] It's good to see you, Matt.
[02:36.040 -> 02:37.880] I'm just a little bit confused right now, though.
[02:37.920 -> 02:40.080] Is it the present, the past or the future?
[02:40.920 -> 02:45.840] Uh, the answer would be yes, because as we all know, Einstein solved this problem by saying
[02:45.840 -> 02:48.960] it was all relative to where you were looking from.
[02:48.960 -> 02:49.960] Perfect.
[02:49.960 -> 02:53.340] And we have a special show today.
[02:53.340 -> 02:58.920] We are not only going to answer my really annoying 79-part questions, but we have some
[02:58.920 -> 03:03.860] listener input, including people who have spoken up for the first time, had many questions
[03:03.860 -> 03:10.620] they were very curious about, but slightly afraid to ask, and even better, Spanners is going to be snoring
[03:10.620 -> 03:12.620] in our ears the whole podcast.
[03:12.620 -> 03:14.540] I am just the producer.
[03:14.540 -> 03:17.860] We'll soon put him to sleep with a tire talk lullaby.
[03:17.860 -> 03:20.660] I'm awake, I'm wide awake, and you can't prove otherwise.
[03:20.660 -> 03:26.360] Yes, well, I'd like to sort of get started here with, I think, a big important but a
[03:26.360 -> 03:30.640] pretty general question, if I may, and it's from Patty.
[03:30.640 -> 03:38.120] And I want to ask this question because it's easy to sling jargon that you hear, and there's
[03:38.120 -> 03:43.120] a lot of jargon in Formula One, and it changes all the time, without really understanding
[03:43.120 -> 03:44.120] it.
[03:44.120 -> 03:47.600] Now, usually I do that if I want to win a WhatsApp debate with like certain other panel
[03:47.600 -> 03:49.160] members.
[03:49.160 -> 03:56.520] But the reality is, Patty asked, what is the definition of whole car aero concept and what
[03:56.520 -> 03:57.760] makes a good one?
[03:57.760 -> 04:00.480] So I felt like we talk about it a lot.
[04:00.480 -> 04:02.820] We probably have a general idea of what's meant by it.
[04:02.820 -> 04:07.520] But when you use that term or when engineers in Formula 1 use that term, what are they
[04:07.520 -> 04:13.740] referencing specifically and sort of what goes into, you know, choosing your concept
[04:13.740 -> 04:14.740] for the season?
[04:14.740 -> 04:18.700] Is it just like throwing darts at a dartboard, picking stocks, or is there a little bit more
[04:18.700 -> 04:19.700] involved?
[04:19.700 -> 04:24.640] I mean, I'm not sure that engineers would use that speak as in, you know, whole car
[04:24.640 -> 04:27.920] concept because they see it from a very different perspective.
[04:28.840 -> 04:34.120] However, if you imagine at the start of a regulation set, teams will likely look
[04:34.120 -> 04:39.200] at various different routes to take in order to develop their concept or their car.
[04:39.480 -> 04:42.960] And so that is probably where that definition realistically comes from.
[04:42.960 -> 04:48.880] So if we imagine traveling back in time, as we've already done once in this show, back
[04:48.880 -> 04:53.660] to 2022 and at the start of the regulation sets, we had a number of different concepts
[04:53.660 -> 04:57.040] when it came to the way that the cars were set up.
[04:57.040 -> 05:06.000] So things that were predominantly obvious to people were the side pods. So we've got the downwash ramp side pod
[05:06.000 -> 05:11.000] that was on the Red Bull Alpine and the Alpha Tauri.
[05:11.480 -> 05:14.140] We had Ferrari with their bathtub style solution.
[05:14.140 -> 05:16.300] We had Mercedes with the zero pod.
[05:16.300 -> 05:20.960] We had a hanging sort of solution with Aston Martin.
[05:20.960 -> 05:23.880] And there was a few others amongst that mix.
[05:23.880 -> 05:27.640] So when we're at the start of a regulation set, we have many more
[05:27.640 -> 05:33.360] concepts to talk about, but as time goes by and the law of diminishing
[05:33.360 -> 05:37.760] return starts to appear, teams tend to gravitate towards the solutions that
[05:37.760 -> 05:40.200] appear to offer the most bang for your buck.
[05:40.400 -> 05:43.400] And obviously we're now at the point where everybody's almost
[05:43.680 -> 05:47.000] at the same sort of concept.
[05:47.000 -> 05:52.000] And I would suspect, and I'm sure we'll cover this later on, but the last team that really
[05:52.000 -> 05:57.800] doesn't have a full blown downwash ramp style side pod is Haas.
[05:57.800 -> 06:03.960] I would call what Ferrari are using sort of a halfway concept.
[06:03.960 -> 06:05.000] But that's where we're sort of at
[06:05.120 -> 06:07.000] with the aero concept side of things.
[06:07.000 -> 06:09.960] There's obviously miniature sections to that.
[06:09.960 -> 06:13.800] So you'll see things talked about with front wings
[06:13.800 -> 06:17.480] and rear wings, because there becomes different branches
[06:17.480 -> 06:19.540] appear on it, on the development tree.
[06:19.540 -> 06:22.280] And then there becomes individual DNA
[06:22.280 -> 06:24.520] amongst those different concepts.
[06:24.520 -> 06:29.120] So it's a varied thing, but when we're talking about whole car aero concepts,
[06:29.120 -> 06:32.120] I think what we're talking about is the likes of when we first start a
[06:32.120 -> 06:36.200] regulation set and we see that variation up and down the grid of
[06:36.320 -> 06:37.760] all the different variants.
[06:39.280 -> 06:39.560] Okay.
[06:39.560 -> 06:44.400] So I want to get in and clarify a little bit here, if I may, because one of the
[06:44.400 -> 06:45.360] things that we have
[06:45.360 -> 06:50.800] talked a lot about on race reviews and stuff like that is, oh, well, you know, different cars suit
[06:50.800 -> 06:56.320] different tracks. So like the Mercedes does well at a track that has lots of low speed turns,
[06:56.320 -> 07:02.560] but Red Bull does great at a track that has lots of high speed turns and long straights.
[07:03.440 -> 07:07.160] Doesn't that to a certain extent also play into the idea
[07:07.160 -> 07:10.360] that different cars have different aero concepts
[07:10.360 -> 07:13.560] in the sense that at the beginning of this,
[07:13.560 -> 07:16.560] someone made a decision, oh, we'll be most competitive
[07:16.560 -> 07:18.220] if we make the car most efficient
[07:18.220 -> 07:21.000] and this kind of a setting.
[07:21.000 -> 07:23.320] Yeah, I mean, that also comes down to layouts
[07:23.320 -> 07:25.880] in terms of things like wheelbase.
[07:25.880 -> 07:31.080] And then you have to think about the way that the teams all use different power units.
[07:31.080 -> 07:35.360] So they will obviously have different ways of using the allocated energy that's at their
[07:35.360 -> 07:40.140] disposal, whether that be combustion side or from energy deployments on the electrical
[07:40.140 -> 07:46.840] side of things. So all of these things will come into effect as you say at the
[07:46.840 -> 07:54.000] start of how the team would look at what they're going to produce and those
[07:54.000 -> 08:01.080] discussions will be being had earlier on in this season to look forward
[08:01.080 -> 08:08.920] to 2024 and that's obviously where we've talked about before that the teams, as we've quite rightly mentioned earlier
[08:08.920 -> 08:11.000] about time travel, are always looking
[08:11.000 -> 08:14.280] at the past, present, and future.
[08:14.280 -> 08:17.160] They're never living in one single moment
[08:17.160 -> 08:18.960] because they're trying to study the past
[08:18.960 -> 08:22.480] to understand how they can use that information
[08:22.480 -> 08:25.920] to improve themselves right now and in the future.
[08:26.480 -> 08:33.120] And that's quite an interesting path to follow, especially when it comes to development. As you
[08:33.120 -> 08:39.120] know, I've mentioned in the past about how long it takes for these ideas to go from the actual
[08:39.120 -> 08:49.360] idea stage right through to development. We can be talking weeks upon end and that also then has to be tied into logistically about where it falls into in terms of
[08:49.360 -> 08:53.800] races and so that also bears out in terms of what you've just mentioned
[08:53.800 -> 08:57.880] about circuit characteristics and the way that teams have to think about those
[08:57.880 -> 09:02.360] updates that they're bringing and whether they're going to be effective at
[09:02.360 -> 09:09.840] a certain race or whether they delay them because they will be better served to be bought later on in the season.
[09:09.840 -> 09:17.200] Okay, and that actually makes for a great segue to the next question from Monster Man,
[09:17.200 -> 09:22.360] because they ask, when a driver from a top team crashes and the car has to be craned,
[09:22.360 -> 09:25.680] it's always a huge deal to get a picture of
[09:25.680 -> 09:26.840] the floor.
[09:26.840 -> 09:32.680] How much does this actually help other teams with research and development and potentially
[09:32.680 -> 09:34.320] borrowing ideas?
[09:34.320 -> 09:38.120] And I know I can see you salivating and answering this question.
[09:38.120 -> 09:46.500] Yeah, I mean, I do think that one of the key things about this particular rule set is the fact that the performance
[09:46.500 -> 09:53.740] differentiator has become the underbody performance that's created by the underfloor and that
[09:53.740 -> 09:58.860] all then bleeds outwards to everything else that surrounds it on the car. So whenever
[09:58.860 -> 10:07.280] we do see a car from beneath, there is obviously, you you know people running towards it to be able to get
[10:08.080 -> 10:14.720] those pictures and obviously the main thing from my point of view is being able to compare them
[10:14.720 -> 10:21.600] to images that we've seen in the past now there is a situation whereby we might not have seen an
[10:21.600 -> 10:26.720] update from a team that because we can't see the underside of the car.
[10:26.720 -> 10:29.500] So from my perspective,
[10:29.500 -> 10:31.400] it's always very interesting to see these pictures
[10:31.400 -> 10:33.600] once they're up on the crane,
[10:33.600 -> 10:36.160] because it's something that we don't see
[10:36.160 -> 10:37.600] like a front wing or a rear wing.
[10:37.600 -> 10:41.240] They're very easy to see where the development has come from
[10:41.240 -> 10:44.320] but in terms of the floor, we don't get to see those things.
[10:48.080 -> 10:51.640] I'm going through this year's development schedule at the moment for some articles
[10:51.640 -> 10:53.760] that I'll be bringing out at the end of the season.
[10:53.760 -> 10:55.560] And because it's such a long season this year,
[10:55.560 -> 10:57.520] I'm having to prepare them even earlier
[10:57.520 -> 10:58.960] than I have in the past.
[10:58.960 -> 11:02.280] And it amazed me that when I looked back
[11:02.280 -> 11:05.280] through these updates that we've seen,
[11:05.440 -> 11:08.760] how many of the updates we didn't see until much later,
[11:08.960 -> 11:12.160] when obviously the reveals happened because the cars were lifted.
[11:12.880 -> 11:18.320] However, in terms of the teams and the way that they will accrue knowledge,
[11:18.960 -> 11:25.600] they do get some of these photos ahead of time because all of the teams will use spy
[11:25.600 -> 11:29.400] photography so they'll have their own photographers in the pit lane trying to
[11:29.400 -> 11:35.640] get the best images they can and invariably they will accrue images via
[11:35.640 -> 11:40.200] the fact that the flaws are carried into into the garages etc and we don't see
[11:40.200 -> 11:49.240] those sort of things very often. However, I do think there is some bleed off, especially with the top teams.
[11:49.520 -> 11:55.080] So if we look back to when Red Bull's floor was first seen at Monaco, there
[11:55.080 -> 12:00.120] was a big hoo-ha about, oh, they're doing this X, Y, and Z, certainly in
[12:00.120 -> 12:03.200] terms of the way that they're using the expansion under the floor.
[12:03.680 -> 12:09.000] And obviously the reason there was a lot of debate around this is because other
[12:09.000 -> 12:11.720] teams weren't doing those similar things.
[12:12.000 -> 12:15.280] And so it appeared that Red Bull were obviously one or two
[12:15.280 -> 12:16.800] steps ahead of everybody else.
[12:17.160 -> 12:22.440] And we have over the course of the season started to see other teams
[12:22.440 -> 12:24.120] starting to borrow those ideas.
[12:24.360 -> 12:26.320] Like I've said, though, it takes time.
[12:26.320 -> 12:29.520] It's not something that you can literally just copy and paste
[12:29.520 -> 12:30.680] and put it on the car.
[12:30.680 -> 12:32.720] So you have to work your way through these things
[12:32.720 -> 12:34.280] and there's a process involved.
[12:37.400 -> 12:39.900] Right, and to that end,
[12:40.840 -> 12:43.400] so let's take a team like Williams,
[12:43.400 -> 12:46.240] which I know I believe you have said, or at least
[12:46.240 -> 12:54.000] I have seen people say, has some similarities broadly to Red Bull.
[12:54.000 -> 13:00.280] So what you're suggesting is if they had already had the same general idea as Red Bull, obviously
[13:00.280 -> 13:10.800] not as well developed because they don't have the same budget and you know a decades worth of accrued information technology advantage and so forth. But if
[13:10.800 -> 13:15.160] they were headed down the same general path a picture of a Red Bull floor might
[13:15.160 -> 13:19.600] be really useful to them as they're thinking about what to do with next
[13:19.600 -> 13:27.160] year's car. Most certainly but there is only so much you can learn from a photograph.
[13:27.160 -> 13:34.220] And obviously we do have more rules in place in regards to the lending of information from
[13:34.220 -> 13:40.080] one team to another in terms of photography, you know, because of what happened in the
[13:40.080 -> 13:41.080] past.
[13:41.080 -> 13:42.080] However...
[13:42.080 -> 13:43.080] Aston.
[13:43.080 -> 13:50.320] I didn't say the past. However, I didn't say the words. If, however, we're talking about Williams,
[13:50.320 -> 13:55.920] Red Bull actually copied something from Williams, which was an interesting nugget, which they
[13:55.920 -> 14:00.360] openly admitted that they'd copied it from one of their rivals, or they borrowed that
[14:00.360 -> 14:05.320] idea from one of their rivals. And it was in as much as the corner of the diffuser in which,
[14:05.320 -> 14:08.800] you know, the geometry of the corner of the diffuser.
[14:08.800 -> 14:11.680] And that's now found its way onto the Red Bull.
[14:11.680 -> 14:15.760] So it's not only the front teams that teams copy from,
[14:15.760 -> 14:17.880] there's always good ideas.
[14:17.880 -> 14:20.840] It's just how they're implemented and whether they're going to
[14:20.840 -> 14:22.080] add performance to the car.
[14:22.080 -> 14:26.600] Now, this was something that would come across as quite minor if you looked at it,
[14:26.780 -> 14:28.600] you know, through, through the photos.
[14:28.600 -> 14:33.920] But, um, from obviously the data point of view, Red Bull found that they found some
[14:33.920 -> 14:37.820] performance in CFD in the wind tunnel and it's now on the RB19.
[14:37.820 -> 14:41.060] So it's not something that's isolated to just the top teams.
[14:41.360 -> 14:46.000] Uh, all of the teams will be looking at one another to try to find the next big thing
[14:46.000 -> 14:48.660] that will help them improve their performance.
[14:49.540 -> 14:50.720] Okay.
[14:50.720 -> 14:53.640] And so like, just to contrast
[14:53.640 -> 14:55.720] before we move on to our next question,
[14:55.720 -> 14:58.040] a team, let's say like Mercedes,
[14:59.240 -> 15:01.160] would have a much harder time
[15:01.160 -> 15:04.120] making direct use of that information
[15:04.120 -> 15:07.200] because fundamentally their car works better
[15:07.200 -> 15:13.280] under different circumstances. So that implies that how they're using all of their stuff
[15:14.400 -> 15:20.800] wouldn't really necessarily be as well served by the information they glean from rivals who
[15:20.800 -> 15:26.920] treat things differently. Yeah, but I would still say it could be applicable in as much as the way I've just mentioned
[15:26.920 -> 15:33.160] about Red Bull finding information from Williams because although they do have very similar
[15:33.160 -> 15:39.640] concepts in some ways, there is still a huge amount of differences in the dimensions that
[15:39.640 -> 15:50.440] we're talking about on each car and the way that everything interacts with one another. Um, what I do think is that we tend to get trapped sometimes into just looking
[15:50.440 -> 15:54.580] or hyper-focused on certain areas of the car, rather than seeing it as a more
[15:54.580 -> 16:02.080] general overview, because that's where the development always appears to be heading in.
[16:02.440 -> 16:06.560] Um, but yeah, certainly obviously, obviously, when you are looking at two cars
[16:06.560 -> 16:08.880] that are very, very different to one another,
[16:08.880 -> 16:13.160] the Red Bull and the Mercedes for argument's sake,
[16:13.160 -> 16:15.000] then yes, it is gonna be difficult
[16:15.000 -> 16:17.440] to make something that is transferable.
[16:17.440 -> 16:21.680] And even more so, which I'm sure we might get back to later,
[16:21.680 -> 16:23.120] in terms of the Mercedes,
[16:23.120 -> 16:25.580] which is very much a Franken car this year.
[16:25.580 -> 16:30.380] And obviously they're having to do certain things that they will have to look at again
[16:30.380 -> 16:31.380] into 2024.
[16:31.380 -> 16:32.380] Yeah.
[16:32.380 -> 16:38.660] And although I am tempted to make a pub analogy here, I won't.
[16:38.660 -> 16:42.580] Instead I'll make a car analogy, which is like when you have that old car that's been
[16:42.580 -> 16:47.560] running fine and then you put the one new part on it, which we would say,
[16:47.600 -> 16:49.040] Oh, look, a picture of a Red Bull floor.
[16:49.040 -> 16:50.600] Let's just stick that on the car.
[16:50.800 -> 16:54.520] You put that one new part in and then every other thing starts breaking.
[16:55.200 -> 16:56.720] So it would be a similar thing.
[16:56.720 -> 17:01.080] And that's why teams, that's why there's only so much immediate use a team can get
[17:01.120 -> 17:03.400] out of say a picture of a floor like that.
[17:03.880 -> 17:04.080] Yeah.
[17:04.080 -> 17:06.000] I mean, I've talked about it on many occasions,
[17:06.000 -> 17:08.200] and obviously I know you've lent this phrase before,
[17:08.200 -> 17:10.000] but it's an aerodynamic handshake.
[17:10.000 -> 17:12.000] You know, at the end of the day, all of these components
[17:12.000 -> 17:14.500] talk to one another in many respects,
[17:14.500 -> 17:17.000] and if they don't harmoniously talk to one another,
[17:17.000 -> 17:19.500] then that's where they start to break down
[17:19.500 -> 17:21.000] and have those issues.
[17:21.000 -> 17:25.840] So, like you say, unless it's really going to work for them, they're not
[17:25.840 -> 17:31.180] just going to simply press control and C and control and V and be out of there because
[17:31.180 -> 17:36.100] that just doesn't work in Formula One. And it hasn't for a long time, not just this particular
[17:36.100 -> 17:40.680] regulation set, but into the past as well. You know, when we're talking about people
[17:40.680 -> 17:46.640] just thinking, oh, a front wing off of one car will work on another. It's not quite that simple because of how everything
[17:46.640 -> 17:49.640] works in harmony with one another.
[17:49.640 -> 18:05.000] Yeah, persnickety is a word I would use. It's very fickle, the wind. And if you get slightly out of alignment, the entire thing can break down.
[18:05.400 -> 18:07.200] I've read some interesting stuff online,
[18:07.200 -> 18:10.600] but I wanna move us along a little bit here
[18:10.600 -> 18:12.640] because how long have we been talking
[18:12.640 -> 18:15.080] and tires haven't come up at all.
[18:15.080 -> 18:17.400] I feel like I'm missing out here.
[18:17.400 -> 18:20.120] Like I'm not fulfilling my brand.
[18:20.120 -> 18:23.360] We had a great question from Thomas Evans.
[18:23.360 -> 18:27.400] Why do the front tires point in slightly and rear tires point out?
[18:28.160 -> 18:31.960] Also, does tire toe and camber affect setup?
[18:31.960 -> 18:32.660] And then.
[18:33.960 -> 18:36.360] What are the advantages or disadvantages?
[18:36.360 -> 18:41.000] Now, again, I think, you know, encyclopedic books have been written about this,
[18:41.000 -> 18:45.240] so we might have to be slightly briefer, but could you give us an
[18:45.240 -> 18:52.320] overview of why teams like WETTO is, what Canberra is, and how teams use them to improve
[18:52.320 -> 18:54.400] the performance of the tires?
[18:54.400 -> 18:58.720] Yeah, I mean, again, this sort of thing is always a trade-off.
[18:58.720 -> 19:10.880] Now, one thing that I did want to bring up, because obviously I did get wind of some of these notes is there's a what I call a cheat sheet available in the event notes section of
[19:10.880 -> 19:15.560] the at each particular race so I've pulled up the ones from Qatar to give us
[19:15.560 -> 19:19.680] an example now we're talking about Canberra now that is one thing obviously
[19:19.680 -> 19:27.200] that is in the range of what can and can't be changed but But there is a limit that is invoked by Pirelli
[19:27.200 -> 19:32.960] in order that the tyres aren't pushed beyond a certain point. And that is purely because we had
[19:32.960 -> 19:38.720] instances in the past where teams were running way beyond what was the recommended, but was
[19:38.720 -> 19:46.080] unenforceable limit of camber back in I think it was 2012 and you could start to see a line building up on the
[19:46.080 -> 19:53.440] outside of the tyres because essentially what the camber does is it promotes a sort of v-shape in the
[19:54.160 -> 20:02.720] setup so you'd have the tyres lenting from bottom to top. Now the camber limit for
[20:08.080 -> 20:13.120] bottom to top. Now the camber limit for Qatar at the front was 2.75 degrees and at the rear was 1.5 degrees. Now these are things that obviously Pirelli have worked out from their simulations
[20:13.120 -> 20:20.560] and they can adapt from race to race so that the teams don't push the tyres beyond a limit point
[20:20.560 -> 20:27.240] that they believe to be a problem. Now obviously we reached beyond that limit point that they believe to be a problem. Now, obviously we reached beyond that limit point in Qatar because of the fact
[20:27.240 -> 20:31.320] that we had what I would call a very historical moment in Formula One,
[20:31.560 -> 20:35.080] whereby we could only run a certain number of laps on a set of tyres.
[20:36.840 -> 20:41.680] But as I've mentioned, that limit is in place and has been in place for not
[20:41.680 -> 20:46.880] only the entirety of this season, but obviously going into the history books as well.
[20:47.800 -> 20:52.240] And also obviously things that people may or may not be interested in are
[20:52.240 -> 20:53.840] things like tyre pressure limits.
[20:53.840 -> 20:56.640] They're very important in terms of performance.
[20:56.840 -> 21:03.240] So teams would probably run them as low as they could possibly get away with, but
[21:03.280 -> 21:05.680] they do have to stay within a minimum starting
[21:05.680 -> 21:11.920] pressure. And then Pirelli now work on an expected stabilized running pressure, which obviously they
[21:11.920 -> 21:18.560] can now monitor from the introduction of the tire monitoring that's available to them. So if we
[21:18.560 -> 21:25.400] again look at what they had in Qatar, at the front, it was 25 PSI and at the rear 21.5 PSI.
[21:25.400 -> 21:28.800] Now that is extreme for the tyres.
[21:29.040 -> 21:31.360] It is something that they were trying to bring down when we
[21:31.360 -> 21:33.000] introduced the 18-inch tyres.
[21:33.320 -> 21:38.620] But obviously the teams have pushed beyond the limits of what
[21:38.960 -> 21:43.600] Pirelli originally thought that would be happening this season.
[21:43.920 -> 21:48.060] And so that's always the fight between the teams and Pirelli originally thought that would be happening this season. And so that's always the fight between the teams and Pirelli.
[21:48.240 -> 21:53.140] But just going back to the question, obviously, towing, tow out and camber
[21:53.140 -> 21:59.720] are something that the teams will invariably try to utilize in order to get a better
[21:59.720 -> 22:01.740] setup in terms of tyre degradation.
[22:01.980 -> 22:07.360] And obviously in terms of the way that the suspension reacts,
[22:07.360 -> 22:15.600] etc. But it is a, I don't like to say a black art because tyres are a black art in many ways.
[22:15.600 -> 22:19.120] Some teams are just very good at it and other teams tend to struggle with that, but
[22:20.800 -> 22:23.680] it is an area of performance that the teams have to
[22:24.800 -> 22:26.720] very finely tune in order to
[22:26.720 -> 22:29.400] get the very best out of them.
[22:29.400 -> 22:33.480] Okay, so let me just understand this clearly.
[22:33.480 -> 22:38.480] If I were to say, take my two hands and point the palms at each other, and then point my
[22:38.480 -> 22:43.580] fingers at the ceiling, and then if I tilt my hands towards each other, or tilt them
[22:43.580 -> 22:45.180] away from each other, that's
[22:45.180 -> 22:46.720] camber, correct?
[22:46.720 -> 22:47.720] Correct.
[22:47.720 -> 22:53.480] Now, if I do the same thing, only I point my fingers straight ahead at each other or
[22:53.480 -> 22:56.320] away from each other, that's toe.
[22:56.320 -> 22:58.760] Toe in and toe out, yes.
[22:58.760 -> 23:07.080] Now think of Das, because Das was effectively messing with that as well on a variable solution in many ways.
[23:08.920 -> 23:13.920] So Das was something that Mercedes introduced
[23:14.720 -> 23:18.080] several years ago now, but was banned almost immediately
[23:18.920 -> 23:22.360] because it was, well, it was allowed to be run for a season,
[23:22.360 -> 23:25.340] but it was an idea that Mercedes had in sitting
[23:25.340 -> 23:32.000] in a drawer and decided to implement purely because they had the capability to introduce
[23:32.000 -> 23:34.160] it at that particular point.
[23:34.160 -> 23:42.460] But obviously because it was a driver-controlled setting that was being used during the course
[23:42.460 -> 23:45.600] of racing conditions, the FIA decided that
[23:45.600 -> 23:49.520] it was something that they didn't want every team to exploit going forward.
[23:49.520 -> 23:54.440] So they only allowed it for one season, but that was something that was working in that
[23:54.440 -> 24:00.600] realm and allowed adjustability during the course of a race.
[24:00.600 -> 24:06.880] And if I tilt the wheels towards each other, camber, that would be negative camber.
[24:06.880 -> 24:12.060] The advantage, as I understand it, is that when I go into a turn, all the weight goes
[24:12.060 -> 24:17.660] to the outside, and then that wheel actually gets shoved fully onto its contact patch.
[24:17.660 -> 24:21.940] So if I get the camber right, then I'll have more grip around that turn.
[24:21.940 -> 24:25.620] Yeah, and as I mentioned, that's why we started to see teams go
[24:25.620 -> 24:28.820] beyond what was considered to be the recommended limits because
[24:28.820 -> 24:32.420] there was a reason for that, increased performance.
[24:32.620 -> 24:34.920] And so that's why now that we find that there's a limit in
[24:34.920 -> 24:40.020] place to stop teams actually taking things too far and almost
[24:40.420 -> 24:43.820] causing issues for Pirelli in as much as that we could have
[24:43.820 -> 24:52.000] construction failures, which we had roughly around that sort of time at SPAR. I think it was SPAR 2012,
[24:52.000 -> 24:56.240] which was when all of this really came to a head and that's when the limit was put in place.
[24:57.920 -> 25:13.520] Okay, I have the next question, but first I think I have a bumper.
[25:17.440 -> 25:21.360] All right, we've been dancing around conceptually, but I think it's time for the rubber to meet the road, so to speak.
[25:22.320 -> 25:27.120] And this is the question that I think everyone needs an answer to now.
[25:27.120 -> 25:35.120] We've seen McLaren show up and absolutely whoop on everybody but Red Bull.
[25:35.120 -> 25:38.760] And even there, they've made it closer than it's been in the past, but perhaps for reasons
[25:38.760 -> 25:42.060] that aren't directly related to their upgrade.
[25:42.060 -> 25:46.800] And then we have Mercedes, which has sort of traditionally been the absolute rival
[25:47.360 -> 25:53.040] to Red Bull. Who's going to win in 2024? Tell us now, please, in a short sentence.
[25:54.800 -> 25:56.320] I'm not sticking my money on that.
[25:58.240 -> 26:01.520] Wait, you're not going Ferrari, are you? Because even if they have the best car,
[26:01.520 -> 26:02.480] there's no way they're going to win.
[26:04.040 -> 26:10.240] Because even if they have the best car, there's no way they're going to win. I often say this, but Ferrari tend to Ferrari themselves quite often.
[26:10.240 -> 26:13.960] Unfortunately it tends to be a trend at Ferrari.
[26:13.960 -> 26:19.160] I'm not saying that that will happen and I really do hope that they move forward for
[26:19.160 -> 26:21.320] next year and make a leap forward.
[26:21.320 -> 26:25.200] I think they've got a good, a better handling on the car this year and
[26:25.200 -> 26:27.600] found ways to improve performance.
[26:27.600 -> 26:32.540] But in terms of McLaren and Mercedes, I think it's a very difficult
[26:32.540 -> 26:33.740] one to call for next year.
[26:34.040 -> 26:39.840] I think there's various avenues that you can go down in terms of trying to
[26:39.840 -> 26:44.140] understand the mechanisms in which one might be better than the other.
[26:44.580 -> 26:49.560] I do think that McLaren probably have a very good head start on Mercedes in
[26:49.560 -> 26:54.520] many ways, because they moved their concept more towards a Red Bull style
[26:54.520 -> 27:01.360] layout with their latest updates, which have come over the course of a few
[27:01.840 -> 27:05.000] different development tranches, let's say.
[27:05.840 -> 27:08.280] So we had the first one in Austria,
[27:08.280 -> 27:10.240] which was followed up quickly in Silverstone.
[27:10.240 -> 27:13.000] And I would call that probably update one,
[27:13.000 -> 27:16.080] which was basically a major shift
[27:16.080 -> 27:18.100] towards what we see from Red Bull.
[27:18.100 -> 27:21.460] And then we've had a more recent update as well from them,
[27:21.460 -> 27:24.440] which has really transformed the car once again.
[27:24.440 -> 27:26.000] So it's really started to come to life now.
[27:26.000 -> 27:28.000] But they did have a good platform.
[27:28.000 -> 27:30.000] Let's just put that out there.
[27:30.000 -> 27:35.000] At the end of the day, what they have changed are aerodynamic parts
[27:35.000 -> 27:40.000] and the internal radiator positions, et cetera.
[27:40.000 -> 27:43.000] So most of what they have done this season has come down
[27:43.000 -> 27:48.040] to aerodynamic development, which means that they already had a decent platform.
[27:49.240 -> 27:54.640] Although obviously Lando Norris isn't quite happy with how that transfers to
[27:54.640 -> 27:58.440] his driving liking at times, but it's a quick car, isn't it?
[27:58.440 -> 27:58.640] So.
[27:58.640 -> 27:59.880] Yeah, he's too fast in it.
[27:59.880 -> 28:01.120] Basically it's his complaint.
[28:01.400 -> 28:01.760] Yeah.
[28:02.240 -> 28:05.600] Now, if we look at Mercedes, they,
[28:05.600 -> 28:08.260] as I mentioned earlier in the show, have a Franken car.
[28:08.260 -> 28:10.560] Now, the reason I call it a Franken car
[28:10.560 -> 28:12.200] is because they started off the season
[28:12.200 -> 28:13.960] with the zero-pod solution,
[28:13.960 -> 28:17.280] or a development of the zero-pod solution,
[28:17.280 -> 28:19.800] and quickly realized that it wasn't the route
[28:19.800 -> 28:22.760] that they realistically wanted to continue with.
[28:22.760 -> 28:26.480] However, because of the way that the side impact protection
[28:26.480 -> 28:33.040] spars are set up in the chassis and the position of the cockpit and all of those sort of things,
[28:33.040 -> 28:37.760] those are things that you can't really change in season because you can't re-homologate a chassis
[28:37.760 -> 28:50.800] under the cost cap. It's almost impossible based on the rest of the development that you must do throughout the course of the season to maintain the gap to your rivals. So they've kind of had to come along with
[28:50.800 -> 29:00.000] this halfway solution that maintains the chassis elements whilst changing the aerodynamic profile
[29:00.000 -> 29:05.760] of the side pods and the associated things like the floor that go with that engine cover etc.
[29:07.200 -> 29:13.680] Which has done them fine and allowed them to close the gap somewhat. However it isn't the
[29:13.680 -> 29:21.120] entire story and we all know that they've been working on a parallel development plan for 2024
[29:21.120 -> 29:25.880] which is obviously very different to the plan that they started off in 2023.
[29:25.880 -> 29:33.360] So although we sort of see a diverging development structure for 2023, I do think they will start
[29:33.360 -> 29:39.680] to converge again for 2024 and we'll see something more akin to the McLaren and the Red Bull
[29:39.680 -> 29:40.680] on the Mercedes.
[29:40.680 -> 29:49.640] But I still think, you know, at the end of the day, they are fundamentally different teams and they approach things from a different way of development.
[29:49.640 -> 29:51.400] So there will be differences.
[29:51.760 -> 29:55.920] Most of the time, I think most people think if you made all the cars white, you
[29:55.920 -> 29:57.280] couldn't tell the difference between them.
[29:57.520 -> 30:01.400] I mean, clearly I can because someone's tried that on me before.
[30:01.680 -> 30:10.320] But for the most part, I think most people might struggle between the McLaren and the
[30:10.320 -> 30:12.480] Red Bull as they are currently set out now.
[30:13.000 -> 30:17.760] I think the most interesting part will be how Red Bull developed going into 2024
[30:18.280 -> 30:21.080] because of obviously the progress they've made this season.
[30:21.440 -> 30:25.600] But I'm very, very happy that McLaren have made the step they have,
[30:26.160 -> 30:32.800] because we did need another team to vault the gap between the midfield and the front end,
[30:32.800 -> 30:36.160] and McLaren have obviously done that. We all obviously thought it was going to be Aston
[30:36.160 -> 30:40.080] Martin at the start of the season, but they didn't quite make the leap we all thought.
[30:40.640 -> 30:46.640] But I think it will be very, very tight between Mercedes and McLaren for next season.
[30:46.640 -> 30:52.680] But I do have the sneaking suspicion of a voice in the back of my head, and it might
[30:52.680 -> 30:58.080] be Ron Dennis telling me about how a works team will always beat a customer team.
[30:58.080 -> 31:00.920] Wow, that's a very interesting thing.
[31:00.920 -> 31:09.120] And it's astonishing to me how high a hurdle a simple letter from the FIA can be for certain teams when they look like they have made a leap.
[31:09.120 -> 31:11.520] Yes.
[31:11.520 -> 31:15.000] Yes, that's right. I'm referencing...
[31:15.000 -> 31:16.720] You're going there, are you?
[31:16.720 -> 31:22.840] I'm just mentioning it, the whole aero-elasticity thing. But I just wanted to be clear about
[31:22.840 -> 31:33.600] something between McLaren and Mercedes before we go and have some ridiculous gossip mongering fun with that. Mercedes came with
[31:33.600 -> 31:39.040] the zero pods and came with a car that had to be designed a specific way for the zero pods.
[31:39.040 -> 31:43.840] And when they realized that wasn't their route, they were inherently, as you said, a Franken car.
[31:43.840 -> 31:45.040] There was no way they
[31:45.040 -> 31:49.840] could actually implement the full idea that they had for the other path they thought would be
[31:49.840 -> 32:01.880] successful. McLaren told us, essentially, we realized slightly too late for the 23 season,
[32:01.880 -> 32:05.060] because it's 23 now. I don't even know what year it is anymore.
[32:05.060 -> 32:06.160] That's how old I am.
[32:07.060 -> 32:10.600] We, we, we had this idea, but it was a little bit late.
[32:10.600 -> 32:15.520] So we just essentially decided to go the other direction with our Franken car.
[32:15.720 -> 32:20.120] We sort of put the underlying chassis in place so that when we were finally
[32:20.120 -> 32:23.420] able to build it all, we'd have the car we'd want to hang it on.
[32:24.040 -> 32:26.080] Is that sort of what, and that's why we saw this wildly diverging performance able to build it all, we'd have the car we'd want to hang it on.
[32:31.120 -> 32:36.560] And that's why we saw this wildly diverging performance between McLaren and Mercedes, because Mercedes was able to just bodge things immediately and get some performance,
[32:36.560 -> 32:40.960] whereas McLaren really had to wait until Austria-Silverstone before they were able
[32:40.960 -> 32:44.400] to start strapping on the parts that they really wanted to go to battle with.
[32:42.760 -> 32:45.200] and for they were able to start strapping on the parts that they really wanted to go to battle with.
[32:45.200 -> 32:48.240] Yeah, I mean, I think the easy way to look at this
[32:48.240 -> 32:50.920] is to go and have a look at the side pod inlet
[32:50.920 -> 32:52.960] and the actual design of the side pod itself.
[32:52.960 -> 32:55.520] So in Mercedes case, if you look at that,
[32:55.520 -> 32:57.560] you will see a more traditional inlet,
[32:57.560 -> 33:00.960] which is housed beneath the side impact protection spar
[33:00.960 -> 33:03.400] because of the way it's hidden inside the fairing,
[33:03.400 -> 33:09.300] which is pushed right the way forward, probably right to the limit of the regulations.
[33:09.300 -> 33:19.920] If you look at McLaren, they have a high positioned inlet, very much in the same realms of the
[33:19.920 -> 33:26.300] Red Bull, which if we look at the previous regulation set, this is an idea that's borrowed essentially
[33:26.300 -> 33:29.100] from that regulation set and just implemented
[33:29.100 -> 33:30.680] in a slightly different way.
[33:30.680 -> 33:32.360] And it's all to do with tyre wake.
[33:32.360 -> 33:35.040] You know, it's how teams deal with the problem
[33:35.040 -> 33:38.440] of the tyre wake, how they increase performance
[33:38.440 -> 33:40.080] to the undercut of the side part
[33:40.080 -> 33:42.360] and how they deliver performance to the rear of the car
[33:42.360 -> 33:44.160] over the side part and the floor.
[33:45.160 -> 33:50.440] In terms of the McLaren, because they'd already started down the downwash ramp solution, but
[33:50.440 -> 33:56.200] didn't fully integrate it in the same way as Red Bull, as you say, structurally inside
[33:56.200 -> 34:01.160] the side pods, they were pretty much set up to make this change.
[34:01.160 -> 34:06.040] Whereas Mercedes just aren't anywhere near that realm because of the way
[34:06.040 -> 34:08.560] in which they started the season with the Zero Pod.
[34:08.560 -> 34:15.560] So it's all down to how the chassis integrates with these aerodynamic structures that we're
[34:15.560 -> 34:22.240] talking about and how you move the airflow around them in order to get the best performance
[34:22.240 -> 34:25.760] from them, whilst also obviously taking into account
[34:25.760 -> 34:30.240] everything else that's happening in terms of the underfloor, you know, and everything else
[34:30.240 -> 35:25.880] that's going on around the car. all slash safety to learn more and activate the 14-day trial period. All the way to the did we just hit a million orders stage, Shopify's there to help you grow.
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[35:38.880 -> 36:06.400] Get a $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com. The of.
[36:06.400 -> 36:11.720] The teams don't often agree on much, but one of the interesting things I've been noticing
[36:11.720 -> 36:16.720] is pretty much all the teams are saying at this point for the season, we've come to the
[36:16.720 -> 36:23.840] point where we need to fundamentally change some things with the chassis in order to find
[36:23.840 -> 36:25.560] more performance.
[36:28.960 -> 36:30.640] And so, uh, is interesting as that question was, uh, from Daz about McLaren and Mercedes.
[36:30.920 -> 36:38.320] It also kind of brings into focus this next question from SN893, which is how
[36:38.320 -> 36:43.480] much performance is left to extract from this rule set.
[36:43.480 -> 36:46.880] Now, if I'm Pirelli, this is always a dangerous question
[36:46.880 -> 36:50.360] and I always underestimate exactly how much is left,
[36:50.360 -> 36:55.360] but we're also talking about relative performance here.
[36:55.920 -> 36:59.200] Are we starting to get into much more marginal gains
[36:59.200 -> 37:03.960] for Red Bull than say a Claren or Mercedes or Ferrari,
[37:03.960 -> 37:06.620] or even Alpine if they get the
[37:06.620 -> 37:11.480] engine variants they're seeking from the FIA. I still think there's probably a
[37:11.480 -> 37:15.180] great deal of performance left on the table in terms of these regulations and
[37:15.180 -> 37:19.440] I think one of the main contributors I will mention to that is how late
[37:19.440 -> 37:27.360] changes were made to the floor scenario for 2023. So obviously we made changes to the floor edge,
[37:28.080 -> 37:33.760] we raised it etc. which obviously had an impact on development schedules for everybody because
[37:33.760 -> 37:47.600] they'd already got things in the tunnel at that stage and then were suddenly having to make In terms of can Red Bull stay ahead of the pack, I think yes,
[37:48.200 -> 37:55.320] not unfortunately, but in terms of the fact that we want more
[37:55.320 -> 37:59.160] teams that are converging on one another for better racing.
[38:00.960 -> 38:08.700] So I think from a performance point of view, I think we'll see Red Bull continue to push forward.
[38:08.700 -> 38:11.600] I think the other teams have closed that gap somewhat.
[38:11.600 -> 38:20.600] However, I think the other thing that we have to think about here is the way in which the CFD and wind tunnel usage and the allocation that each of the teams have,
[38:20.600 -> 38:27.240] obviously has a bearing on how much that the teams can do compared to their
[38:27.240 -> 38:36.200] rivals. So that has started to kind of impact certain teams, but I think over the course
[38:36.200 -> 38:42.720] of a season, the teams get used to that and they're having to concentrate on parallel
[38:42.720 -> 38:46.760] developments both on the current car and their future cars.
[38:46.760 -> 38:51.360] So it's always a fighting battle between what's going on the car now,
[38:51.360 -> 38:54.400] what's going on in the future and next year's car, etc, etc.
[38:54.400 -> 38:57.360] So it's what you give and take between those projects
[38:57.360 -> 38:59.360] to be able to get the best out of it.
[38:59.360 -> 39:02.280] But I do think there's still a huge amount of performance on the table
[39:02.520 -> 39:07.800] and certain teams still haven't copied certain other aspects of certain cars that are
[39:07.800 -> 39:10.040] obviously got a performance advantage.
[39:10.560 -> 39:13.240] And so, you know, there's still more there.
[39:13.400 -> 39:14.720] That's a simple fact of the matter.
[39:14.960 -> 39:20.920] When we were in old regulation sets, sort of the 2009 to 2013, we thought, oh, we're
[39:20.920 -> 39:23.720] not going to see anything more of in terms of improvements.
[39:23.720 -> 39:27.360] And then all of a sudden somebody had come along with a exhaust blown diffuser
[39:27.360 -> 39:31.040] and they change the landscape. So I'm not saying we're going to have that kind of development,
[39:31.040 -> 39:35.040] but there's always something out there that will add performance. And
[39:36.720 -> 39:41.280] the Formula One engineers just know how to find those areas of interest.
[39:41.280 -> 39:43.280] Chris So you heard it here first,
[39:43.280 -> 39:45.400] Williams will be the next Braun next season.
[39:45.400 -> 39:46.960] Thank you, Summer, very much for that.
[39:47.000 -> 39:47.240] No.
[39:47.600 -> 39:48.560] Um, okay.
[39:48.560 -> 39:54.240] So this also gets into another thing that, that has been talked about a lot.
[39:54.400 -> 40:01.440] And especially, I mean, I don't want to accuse you of chasing clicks, but you've
[40:01.440 -> 40:09.560] written a fair amount about outwash this season and the teams chasing it and sometimes
[40:09.560 -> 40:12.000] even already being from back.
[40:12.000 -> 40:18.800] And our listener, UWS Kid, which as a New Yorker, I always translate as Upper West Side
[40:18.800 -> 40:26.480] Kid, asks, are we back to the previous regulation set when it comes to dirty air as the teams have found
[40:26.480 -> 40:32.080] all these loopholes with the rear wing, the front wing and stuff like that? Now I'm going to add,
[40:32.080 -> 40:38.560] I'm going to make this a famous multi-part question, I'm going to add on to that or is it
[40:38.560 -> 40:49.500] possible that the raising of the floor edges and diffuser throat has also contributed to the much obvious
[40:49.500 -> 40:50.500] and larger difficulty.
[40:50.500 -> 40:57.000] I mean, I think at Qatar's, some teams were seeking like an eight second gap for qualifying
[40:57.000 -> 40:59.560] in order to be entirely clear of dirty air.
[40:59.560 -> 41:04.080] So is this more than just a simple, the teams have been once again, more clever than the
[41:04.080 -> 41:11.760] FIA. Yeah, I mean, we've had this discussion off air regarding the fact that the way in which
[41:11.760 -> 41:17.760] the rules had to be changed to deal with the porpoising issue by raising the floor and
[41:17.760 -> 41:23.280] dealing with the throat, all this sort of thing, has undoubtedly had an impact on the
[41:23.280 -> 41:26.160] way in which the rules were first envisaged, because
[41:26.160 -> 41:30.400] those simulations were based on something completely different to what we have now.
[41:30.400 -> 41:34.760] That's not to say that it's the only thing. As you've already mentioned, we've got things
[41:34.760 -> 41:38.320] in terms of front wing development, like we have on the Mercedes, where they figured out
[41:38.320 -> 41:46.240] a way to create a slotted section on the end plate, which was never really envisaged within these regulations. We got
[41:46.960 -> 41:53.040] cascade elements on the inboard side of the end plate which were never envisaged and those are
[41:53.040 -> 41:57.920] on sort of the Red Bull, the Ferrari, the Mercedes, the McLaren, all sorts of cars.
[41:58.880 -> 42:08.960] And those all obviously contribute to outwash. I think the one thing that the regulations were trying to reduce in its effect
[42:08.960 -> 42:11.320] because of the way that that creates
[42:11.320 -> 42:13.820] this dirty air problem and the wake.
[42:16.760 -> 42:20.560] Then obviously we've got things like the rear wing end plates
[42:20.560 -> 42:23.440] and the cutouts that have suddenly started to appear.
[42:23.440 -> 42:25.600] And these are all things that at the end of the day,
[42:25.600 -> 42:29.440] the teams are looking for ways to find performance
[42:29.440 -> 42:33.200] and they do not care about the fact of the dirty air.
[42:33.200 -> 42:35.400] It's not their problem.
[42:35.400 -> 42:36.240] They are just simply their-
[42:36.240 -> 42:37.920] Or behind them's problem.
[42:37.920 -> 42:40.040] Yeah, they're just trying to make performance
[42:40.040 -> 42:41.840] at the end of the day.
[42:41.840 -> 42:46.840] So they don't care that the rules don't explicitly tell them
[42:47.040 -> 42:50.160] not to create outwash or not to do X, Y, or Z
[42:50.160 -> 42:51.440] with the rear wing.
[42:51.440 -> 42:54.560] They're looking for ways to increase performance.
[42:54.560 -> 42:58.000] And these are the routes that they're taking to do so.
[42:58.000 -> 43:02.040] However, I don't think we are quite at the same level
[43:02.040 -> 43:04.360] as we were in the past in terms of this problem
[43:04.360 -> 43:05.360] with dirty air.
[43:05.360 -> 43:08.560] And I don't think we probably will get to that stage,
[43:08.560 -> 43:11.080] especially if we have a wind back in certain areas
[43:11.080 -> 43:14.160] like the front wing and the rear wing solutions
[43:14.160 -> 43:15.000] that we've seen.
[43:15.000 -> 43:16.840] Obviously that's not gonna happen for next year,
[43:16.840 -> 43:18.120] I wouldn't have thought because we've,
[43:18.120 -> 43:20.040] you know, that we're past that point.
[43:20.040 -> 43:21.040] Yeah.
[43:21.040 -> 43:23.200] But I do see that that might be an area
[43:23.200 -> 43:27.000] that the FIA may look to deal with in future.
[43:27.000 -> 43:33.000] However, I do think they need to be mindful of this problem, because at the end of the
[43:33.000 -> 43:40.000] day, if we're trying to create a scenario where closer racing is a thing, having the
[43:40.000 -> 43:45.280] dirty air problem is a major issue, because the drivers will just get into a position
[43:45.280 -> 43:46.920] like we were under the old regulations
[43:46.920 -> 43:48.340] where they can't overtake.
[43:48.340 -> 43:51.440] And we are fully reliant on DRS once more,
[43:52.520 -> 43:54.560] which again, as I've mentioned in the past
[43:54.560 -> 43:57.560] is a solution that although as a band-aid
[43:57.560 -> 44:01.640] has dealt with that problems in some manner,
[44:01.640 -> 44:04.000] I still don't think it's the right way to use it,
[44:04.000 -> 44:06.160] but it's there and it's available
[44:06.160 -> 44:14.960] to the teams and the drivers. So I do see a point where the FIA have to step in and deal with this
[44:14.960 -> 44:27.000] problem again. But as we stand right now, I think it's okay, but I do see some time in the future where we might have to address it.
[44:27.000 -> 44:29.000] Okay.
[44:29.000 -> 44:36.360] We've had a lot of fun answering listener questions, and we've sort of danced around
[44:36.360 -> 44:39.400] it earlier with Aston.
[44:39.400 -> 44:41.200] But I'm going to get to it.
[44:41.200 -> 44:47.920] One of the biggest tech stories, and it's especially big because I know certain people
[44:47.920 -> 44:55.120] actually got to see this particular technical directive. Yeah, I have no idea who I'm referring
[44:55.120 -> 45:14.000] to, but I know this happened because I saw stories about it, was that there was some controversy about using aeroelasticity, which is the bendy, wibbly parts, on the floor
[45:14.000 -> 45:20.840] and on the front wing to gain advantage, but there were some interesting details to that.
[45:20.840 -> 45:27.840] Now, I have to ask you, Red Bull said it didn't affect us at all, but ever since then,
[45:27.840 -> 45:36.640] everyone's been a lot closer to them. But most especially, I have to really ask you about Aston,
[45:36.640 -> 45:42.400] because they looked for all the world, like the team that would be chasing Red Bull all season long.
[45:44.800 -> 45:45.200] that would be chasing Red Bull all season long, this happened.
[45:52.120 -> 45:57.940] And, and I mean, is it just a remarkable coincidence or a perfectly normal coincidence that from when this happened, they have lost a great deal of performance
[45:57.940 -> 46:00.260] and have been unable to regain it thus far.
[46:01.700 -> 46:02.080] Okay.
[46:02.080 -> 46:08.280] So we've got a typical Matt Trump, it part question. Let's just cover what happened.
[46:08.280 -> 46:13.600] Okay, so we had two technical directives in the main, one covering the front wing and one covering
[46:13.600 -> 46:19.200] the rear wing. The front wing was to do with the way in which the front wing elements are
[46:19.200 -> 46:25.000] connected to the nose and the elasticity involved in the movement there.
[46:25.580 -> 46:29.580] And then the rear wing was to do with rotation
[46:29.580 -> 46:34.180] and the way in which the wing folds back at speed.
[46:34.180 -> 46:37.220] And now these are areas of development
[46:37.220 -> 46:39.220] that we have seen for years.
[46:39.220 -> 46:41.120] It is nothing new in Formula One.
[46:41.120 -> 46:44.920] It's all about where the development is pushed
[46:44.920 -> 46:46.800] towards in order to make gains.
[46:47.360 -> 46:51.800] Teams have been doing it for decades, in fact, let alone, you know, the last
[46:51.800 -> 46:55.720] decade or so with carbon aero-elasticity.
[46:57.920 -> 47:08.400] There was some interesting comments made in the technical directives in terms of elastometric fillets,
[47:08.400 -> 47:14.200] which means that essentially rubberized sections of the wing and nose connections.
[47:14.200 -> 47:18.000] And if you look at the onboards,
[47:18.000 -> 47:24.200] you can quite clearly see a huge amount of flex on the front wings.
[47:24.200 -> 47:26.380] And I'm not just talking about one team here.
[47:26.380 -> 47:32.880] I'm talking about up and down the grid, but it becomes as usual about how much
[47:32.880 -> 47:36.820] it's been done and who by it's been done and how they're doing it and
[47:36.820 -> 47:38.180] what it's achieving for them.
[47:38.540 -> 47:43.700] So, and the mode that it's happening in.
[47:44.080 -> 47:48.100] So in these circumstances, we're usually talking about drag situation
[47:48.100 -> 47:54.000] because they're trying to bleed drag off from the car at high speeds.
[47:54.000 -> 47:59.000] And that obviously, you know, you can move that lower and lower
[47:59.000 -> 48:03.600] depending on how much you can bend the specific area.
[48:03.600 -> 48:07.280] In terms of Red Bull and has it pegged them back?
[48:07.280 -> 48:13.480] I think undoubtedly there is some difference in terms of the performance gap
[48:13.480 -> 48:21.880] between them and the other teams since the TD arrived and has been put in place.
[48:21.880 -> 48:26.000] So yes, I would suggest that it has dialed them back slightly.
[48:26.300 -> 48:30.500] However, you also have to remember that the other teams
[48:30.500 -> 48:32.200] have also been pegged back by it.
[48:32.300 -> 48:35.100] So they've also lost performance, but they haven't
[48:35.100 -> 48:36.700] lost it to such a margin.
[48:37.500 -> 48:40.000] So it's a very interesting thing to look at.
[48:40.300 -> 48:44.800] If we go to Aston Martin though, although I believe that
[48:44.800 -> 48:47.500] they did get impeded by this,
[48:47.500 -> 48:54.500] I think part of their problem is that they took some development cul-de-sacs.
[48:54.500 -> 48:59.000] They went down some cul-de-sacs that didn't work and have had to U-turn on those.
[48:59.000 -> 49:06.720] And that is problematic because it means that you've essentially lost a huge amount of time in
[49:06.720 -> 49:11.600] your CFD and wind tunnel and you've had to backtrack effectively. You've got yourself
[49:11.600 -> 49:16.560] into a bit of a corner and you might have lost sort of 8 to 10 to 12 weeks worth of work
[49:17.200 -> 49:23.360] and suddenly you're starting from zero again. So I think that's partly where we are with Aston. I
[49:23.360 -> 49:27.600] think yes, all of the teams were pegged back, including Aston with the TDs
[49:27.600 -> 49:30.840] and other stuff that's been going on behind the scenes with flexibility,
[49:30.840 -> 49:33.800] whether it be front wing, floor or rear wing.
[49:34.280 -> 49:39.640] But obviously, I think it's fair to say that they've also struggled
[49:39.640 -> 49:47.920] with some conceptual issues such as the Sipod gullies, because they're the one that were
[49:47.920 -> 49:50.160] at the forefront of that particular development.
[49:52.160 -> 49:55.520] Sorry, I was just busy selling all my stock in aluminum foil.
[49:58.000 -> 50:00.160] Have you not fashioned your hats correctly?
[50:00.160 -> 50:13.800] No, I've not. Apparently not after that answer. Okay. So if I'm Aston and this also interests me because didn't that fundamental concept
[50:13.800 -> 50:16.600] now we're talking about the water slide concept here.
[50:16.800 -> 50:19.400] Didn't that originate really with Alpine?
[50:19.600 -> 50:20.800] It did.
[50:21.000 -> 50:24.600] And then Aston Martin came out at the start of the season with a much more
[50:24.800 -> 50:26.380] developed version of that concept
[50:27.000 -> 50:27.860] however
[50:27.860 -> 50:34.360] They also then upgraded or updated as I like to suggest rather than upgrading because an upgrade
[50:34.600 -> 50:36.600] Suggests that it actually improves performance
[50:36.600 -> 50:37.100] Yeah
[50:37.100 -> 50:37.960] their case
[50:37.960 -> 50:44.380] it was an update because it didn't actually provide the performance that they thought it was going to and the sort of had to
[50:44.480 -> 50:47.720] Side track and backtrack a little bit in many respects
[50:47.920 -> 50:52.960] on certain parts of the car, including their front wing and the side pod solution.
[50:53.160 -> 50:54.240] So
[50:54.440 -> 50:59.200] Aston is a difficult one this year, especially because of what's happened
[50:59.400 -> 51:02.840] with McLaren and the upsurge that they've had in terms of performance.
[51:03.040 -> 51:08.680] They've also taken on the water slide gully solution as well, and obviously had good success with it.
[51:10.080 -> 51:16.040] Yeah, no, I still have a pet theory that the real magic here, and this is just based on,
[51:16.040 -> 51:20.520] I think we had this discussion that McLaren still does their own transmission.
[51:22.320 -> 51:25.000] But I feel like there is a...
[51:25.000 -> 51:28.000] Oh, you know what? There was actually a listener question about this.
[51:28.000 -> 51:29.280] Okay. I don't know who the listener was.
[51:29.280 -> 51:30.800] They asked the question, sent an email.
[51:32.120 -> 51:39.400] My pet theory is that a lot of the performance is being hidden at the rear of the car.
[51:40.320 -> 51:41.720] And how exactly...
[51:41.720 -> 51:47.800] Like, I can't explain fully why I think this, but just having looked at everything,
[51:47.800 -> 51:53.960] it seems like it always comes down to how compliant you can be, you can make your suspension
[51:55.400 -> 51:59.720] while still maintaining an incredibly stable aerodynamic platform.
[51:59.720 -> 52:08.780] Red Bull has obviously done the best. The car looks more like the pre-22 cars than any other one when it goes over curbs and
[52:08.780 -> 52:10.840] bumps and stuff like that.
[52:10.840 -> 52:15.640] But somehow they keep everything stable so they don't lose all of their downforce.
[52:15.640 -> 52:21.680] So the question was, when we saw this regulation start, we had a sudden explanation.
[52:21.680 -> 52:28.220] Everyone got explained to them what a pushrod front end and rear end was and what a pull rod front end and rear end was.
[52:28.760 -> 52:33.760] And two years into these regulations, have we come to any conclusions about
[52:33.760 -> 52:38.560] one being necessarily the correct or the more correct choice for these regulations
[52:39.000 -> 52:41.840] than the other, both at the front and at the back?
[52:44.000 -> 52:47.760] You see, the reason that this is coming up is because the two front runners,
[52:48.120 -> 52:50.600] if you're classifying McLaren as a front runner now,
[52:51.240 -> 52:54.160] is a pull rod at the front and a push rod at the rear.
[52:54.320 -> 52:57.840] Now, for me and my money, that is probably the better solution
[52:57.840 -> 53:02.120] for this particular regulation set, only though because of the way
[53:02.120 -> 53:07.760] that we are set up at the rear of the car in terms of the amount of
[53:07.760 -> 53:13.040] diffuser space that is required for the ground effect tunnels. I'm calling them ground effect
[53:13.040 -> 53:21.600] tunnels, it's not really that sort of thing. But anyway, push rod at the rear allows you more space
[53:21.600 -> 53:29.560] technically to be able to do this sort of thing. So I'm not saying it's the best way to do it.
[53:30.960 -> 53:33.200] It's a trade-off, it always is.
[53:33.200 -> 53:38.080] And I think the trade-off comes in, as you mentioned,
[53:38.080 -> 53:42.280] the best way of keeping a stability
[53:42.280 -> 53:43.880] and the aerodynamic platform
[53:46.520 -> 53:49.640] whilst thinking about the packaging scenario.
[53:49.640 -> 53:52.900] So if we go to the front end for argument's sake
[53:52.900 -> 53:57.000] with the Red Bull and the McLaren having pull rods,
[53:58.320 -> 54:02.480] their aerodynamic profile from the front wing
[54:02.480 -> 54:26.120] to the side pods, which is incredibly important, and from the front wing to the leading edge of the floor, which is incredibly important, is very different to the aerodynamic profile of a car that has a bushrod solution, because of the way you have things in terms of packaging. So you're playing around with weight in this scenario.
[54:26.120 -> 54:27.580] And we're not talking huge amounts of weight,
[54:27.580 -> 54:30.100] but we're talking about weight because of the position
[54:30.100 -> 54:34.080] of the elements in board of a push versus pull rod.
[54:34.080 -> 54:36.580] And also allow some interesting packaging scenarios.
[54:36.580 -> 54:38.900] So let's think about what Red Bull have done this season
[54:38.900 -> 54:40.000] with their chassis.
[54:40.000 -> 54:43.540] Now they have what I will call a V-shaped chassis
[54:43.540 -> 54:48.240] where they've cut away the side cross section of the chassis
[54:48.240 -> 54:50.700] more so than anybody else,
[54:50.700 -> 54:53.540] which is obviously advantageous in allowing the airflow
[54:53.540 -> 54:56.600] to move in that particular area of the car.
[54:56.600 -> 54:59.160] So these things, as we've already said in the past,
[54:59.160 -> 55:01.280] are things that compound with one another.
[55:01.280 -> 55:03.480] You add them step by step.
[55:03.480 -> 55:04.680] And if I'm going to use,
[55:04.680 -> 55:06.400] if we've already talked about golf
[55:06.400 -> 55:08.600] at the start of this live stream.
[55:08.600 -> 55:13.100] Oh, let's talk about it more because you and I both love to play a good game of golf.
[55:13.100 -> 55:18.300] I would describe it as something that we use in golf called strokes gained.
[55:18.300 -> 55:23.300] So strokes gained is when essentially you work out how,
[55:23.300 -> 55:26.040] from a development point of view,
[55:26.040 -> 55:29.280] how far you get down, you will gain strokes on the field.
[55:29.280 -> 55:33.440] Now, this is something that Formula One teams are essentially doing because they're working
[55:33.440 -> 55:42.360] on how to compound every decision they make to the point where it adds performance.
[55:42.360 -> 55:45.000] And that's where we're kind of at with the likes of Red Bull.
[55:45.000 -> 55:48.200] They're already past the point of understanding
[55:48.200 -> 55:50.320] the overall concept of the car,
[55:50.320 -> 55:52.160] and they're now adding performance
[55:52.160 -> 55:55.000] by compounding things down the car.
[55:55.000 -> 55:56.560] Everything you look at on that car
[55:56.560 -> 56:00.900] is just much more honed compared to 2022.
[56:00.900 -> 56:01.800] As I mentioned earlier,
[56:01.800 -> 56:04.800] I'm working on some of the stuff to deal with
[56:04.800 -> 56:05.640] at the end of the season.
[56:05.800 -> 56:07.920] And one of those is a look at the Red Bull.
[56:08.240 -> 56:12.940] And it's very interesting to now look back and compare it with last year's car
[56:12.940 -> 56:18.120] and how much progress that they made between 22 and 23 on very, very
[56:18.120 -> 56:19.320] interesting areas of the car.
[56:19.320 -> 56:23.960] Things like brake ducts, the chassis design, the way they've set the side
[56:23.960 -> 56:26.560] pods up, the input, the improvements that they've set the side pods up, the improvements that
[56:26.560 -> 56:29.360] they've made on the underfloor design.
[56:29.360 -> 56:31.600] They've just compounded everything.
[56:31.600 -> 56:34.280] And other teams are still learning those areas.
[56:34.280 -> 56:35.280] Yeah.
[56:35.280 -> 56:40.200] Well, other teams should have perhaps spent more money coming into the first season of
[56:40.200 -> 56:42.080] these new regulations.
[56:42.080 -> 56:43.240] Yes.
[56:43.240 -> 56:44.600] Prawn sandwiches.
[56:44.600 -> 56:52.160] Prawn sandwiches. Needed more of them. We haven't really talked about, but I think there's one sort
[56:52.160 -> 56:59.520] of big tech story. And by big, I mean like literally quantitatively big tech story heading
[56:59.520 -> 57:08.720] into Austin. And you mentioned them earlier, Haas, just being, well, you know, I think dreadful
[57:08.720 -> 57:10.200] would be acceptable.
[57:10.200 -> 57:14.680] They would, they, they would probably laugh at me because it wouldn't adequately describe
[57:14.680 -> 57:22.760] how bad it's been for them, but they put all of their cookies into the basket at Circuit
[57:22.760 -> 57:25.200] of the Americas to the point where I've
[57:25.200 -> 57:30.040] read they actually had to rent a special garage to get started on their build
[57:30.040 -> 57:33.080] because they would, they didn't think they necessarily have enough time if
[57:33.080 -> 57:36.320] they waited until they could just get the cars and things to the track.
[57:37.160 -> 57:37.280] Yeah.
[57:37.280 -> 57:42.960] Now this is interesting because I would compare this to Mercedes at what was
[57:42.960 -> 57:45.440] going to be Imola and turned out to be Monaco with
[57:45.440 -> 57:46.440] their updates.
[57:46.440 -> 57:52.360] So if you remember, I know it's a long time ago in Formula One terms now, but Imola obviously
[57:52.360 -> 57:57.080] got cancelled and Mercedes were going to turn up with their new side pod solution, which
[57:57.080 -> 57:59.400] was not the Zero Pod.
[57:59.400 -> 58:06.640] Now people exclaimed when they arrived in Monaco with an entirely new car, which included this
[58:06.640 -> 58:11.000] new side pod solution, and why are you doing it at this particular venue because it's so
[58:11.000 -> 58:13.960] difficult to introduce new parts, etc.
[58:13.960 -> 58:20.240] Well, they'd gone past the point of no return, whereby there was modifications made to the
[58:20.240 -> 58:25.200] car that couldn't be U-turned because they'd made them in the name of this new update
[58:25.200 -> 58:30.800] for the side pods. And I think we're going to see very much a similar scenario unfold here with Haas
[58:30.800 -> 58:38.880] in as much as that the upgrade to their side pods is also an update to the internal packaging of the
[58:38.880 -> 58:44.240] car. And that's why they're in this situation where they're having to get ahead of time
[58:44.240 -> 58:49.360] to be able to get the build right ahead of getting to the circuit and then obviously fit the
[58:49.360 -> 58:51.480] bodywork, etc.
[58:51.480 -> 58:59.880] Some of these updates, although you see them, everybody now sees the car presentation documents,
[58:59.880 -> 59:04.640] which should be available to the public.
[59:04.640 -> 59:05.280] They are.
[59:05.720 -> 59:06.160] Yes.
[59:06.160 -> 59:07.640] They're on the FIA website now.
[59:07.840 -> 59:08.280] Yes.
[59:08.360 -> 59:11.240] They are on the FIA website, except for one race.
[59:11.240 -> 59:13.720] They weren't for reasons that I still don't understand.
[59:13.920 -> 59:15.920] I think it was, I think it might've been Japan.
[59:16.000 -> 59:17.440] I've looked for it, but it's not there.
[59:17.480 -> 59:21.480] I have it obviously, but that's by the wayside.
[59:21.560 -> 59:28.340] But you know, the teams only have to be so specific with those things.
[59:28.340 -> 59:29.840] They don't have to tell you everything.
[59:29.840 -> 59:33.320] And there's still a lot of working out that has to be done behind the scenes,
[59:33.320 -> 59:34.500] which is obviously what I do.
[59:34.880 -> 59:39.680] Um, and certainly the one thing that doesn't get talked about is the change
[59:39.680 -> 59:42.860] of internal packaging, because you only have, they only have to talk
[59:42.860 -> 59:45.680] about aerodynamic things, you know, they'll only talk about,
[59:45.680 -> 59:47.760] oh, we changed to the front wing flap
[59:47.760 -> 59:50.220] and we've added a gurney here or there,
[59:50.220 -> 59:52.480] but they don't have to talk about internal changes.
[59:52.480 -> 59:55.120] So there's a lot of things that do continue to change
[59:55.120 -> 59:57.240] that aren't on those particular lists.
[59:57.240 -> 59:59.800] And I think that's partly where we will see
[01:00:01.280 -> 01:00:04.800] HASS looking externally very different,
[01:00:04.800 -> 01:00:06.880] but there will be a lot more under the skin that's
[01:00:06.880 -> 01:00:10.360] changed that most people won't be able to see.
[01:00:10.360 -> 01:00:17.160] And so I'm going to ask, even though I'm afraid I already know the answer, does this big...
[01:00:17.160 -> 01:00:25.880] because they've said it's going to look more like a Red Bull, but does this really represent a sort of a fundamental break with their,
[01:00:25.880 -> 01:00:31.400] we buy everything from Ferrari, or are they once again letting themselves be
[01:00:31.400 -> 01:00:37.500] used as a test bed indirectly, because directly would be absolutely illegal.
[01:00:37.500 -> 01:00:43.760] And I don't mean to suggest they're doing that, but I mean, are they helping
[01:00:43.760 -> 01:00:47.340] Ferrari out here by running what would be next year's
[01:00:47.340 -> 01:00:51.020] parts along with themselves, to be fair?
[01:00:51.020 -> 01:00:56.040] Or are they really just going to go their own direction from here on out?
[01:00:56.040 -> 01:00:57.360] I do know something, Matt.
[01:00:57.360 -> 01:01:03.320] I think you need to go and buy, we buy everything from Ferrari.com as a URL.
[01:01:03.320 -> 01:01:07.200] But no, I honestly don't think that's the direction
[01:01:07.200 -> 01:01:08.400] that they're taking.
[01:01:08.400 -> 01:01:11.600] I think that they're, over the years,
[01:01:11.600 -> 01:01:15.160] they've been unfairly in some ways,
[01:01:15.160 -> 01:01:18.380] ascribed to just copying everything Ferrari do.
[01:01:18.380 -> 01:01:21.960] Now, yes, they do fundamentally go
[01:01:21.960 -> 01:01:23.860] in the same direction as Ferrari,
[01:01:23.860 -> 01:01:25.560] but when you're buying a huge
[01:01:25.560 -> 01:01:32.080] amount of the car structure from that particular supplier and you have their power unit, then
[01:01:32.080 -> 01:01:37.760] you probably are going to follow that direction is the proper way to do it.
[01:01:37.760 -> 01:01:51.580] But it obviously will always put you behind the eight ball as, because you're always following somebody and you're never actually making things develop your own pathway.
[01:01:51.900 -> 01:01:57.140] You're not starting something from scratch and building out from there,
[01:01:57.140 -> 01:01:59.820] like everybody else does up and down the grid.
[01:01:59.820 -> 01:02:02.520] Instead, you're sort of following in the wake of somebody.
[01:02:02.960 -> 01:02:08.800] But I do think that this update from Haas is them stepping out in their own direction in some ways.
[01:02:08.800 -> 01:02:14.200] And yes, it is a major step towards what you will probably see from them in 2024.
[01:02:14.200 -> 01:02:17.900] In fact, you probably see a very, very similar car in 2024.
[01:02:17.900 -> 01:02:21.600] This is probably just a very early tease of that.
[01:02:21.600 -> 01:02:25.020] And then fundamentally, they will change things on the chassis that
[01:02:25.020 -> 01:02:27.380] they can't do this season.
[01:02:28.100 -> 01:02:32.040] And they're going to learn in the back end of this season, what the 2024
[01:02:32.040 -> 01:02:35.920] car is going to perform like in some respects, just as everybody else is
[01:02:35.920 -> 01:02:38.940] doing, you know, that most of the, most of the teams now are either bringing
[01:02:38.940 -> 01:02:44.000] circuit specific updates, things that improve, you know, downforce and drag
[01:02:44.000 -> 01:02:49.040] levels for the specific circuit characteristics we're going to, or they're looking at things
[01:02:49.040 -> 01:02:55.280] that will improve the 2024 car and, you know, fundamentally might have an
[01:02:55.280 -> 01:02:56.480] impact on this year's car.
[01:02:56.840 -> 01:03:02.840] Um, but we're not really going to see any proper 2023 developments anymore.
[01:03:03.440 -> 01:03:06.000] Because this year's kind of spent in that respect.
[01:03:07.920 -> 01:03:14.560] So I do wish I could remember exactly the language they use when they tell the teams
[01:03:14.560 -> 01:03:20.720] what they have to show us. Well, it can be different, but if it's a certain amount
[01:03:20.720 -> 01:03:26.240] different, then yeah, you do have to show us. But if it's just this kind of different, yeah, we don't really care so much.
[01:03:26.280 -> 01:03:31.720] And it is, it is kind of funny how the teams will look at that.
[01:03:32.640 -> 01:03:36.280] Um, and just choose to either include stuff or not, depending
[01:03:36.280 -> 01:03:37.400] upon how they feel like it.
[01:03:37.680 -> 01:03:49.160] Real quick, before we end this on a, uh, high tire note, I. I do want to mention that I have seen McLaren
[01:03:49.160 -> 01:03:54.160] touting their use of recycled carbon fiber.
[01:03:54.720 -> 01:03:57.240] And one of our live chat participants
[01:03:57.240 -> 01:04:01.020] asked about this earlier and said, is this a real thing?
[01:04:01.020 -> 01:04:02.200] Is it just greenwashing?
[01:04:02.200 -> 01:04:05.240] And I do know McLaren also because they worked with B-Comp
[01:04:05.240 -> 01:04:11.860] and that they brought in the flax composite as a substitute for carbon fiber, which in
[01:04:11.860 -> 01:04:16.760] some specifications works very well, but it's a bit heavier. It doesn't necessarily always
[01:04:16.760 -> 01:04:27.400] have exactly the same kind of structural integrity that they look for. So do you have an opinion on this?
[01:04:27.400 -> 01:04:28.960] Do you even know anything about it?
[01:04:28.960 -> 01:04:32.320] Yeah, I mean, as you started talking then I was going to mention B-Comp because they
[01:04:32.320 -> 01:04:39.920] made a seat from that flax material as a way of showing the fact that obviously this technology
[01:04:39.920 -> 01:04:40.920] was available.
[01:04:40.920 -> 01:04:50.600] Although, obviously, as you mentioned, it isn't something that can be used in its entirety around the structure of the car. It can only be used in a very
[01:04:50.600 -> 01:04:58.080] specific way. And in terms of the carbon fiber side of things, yes, I understand what McLaren
[01:04:58.080 -> 01:05:06.860] are looking to do in terms of reducing the footprint of the components that they are generating and obviously recycling or upcycling components
[01:05:06.860 -> 01:05:10.640] in order to reduce their output.
[01:05:10.640 -> 01:05:12.460] Now, as far as I understand it,
[01:05:12.460 -> 01:05:14.900] they're gonna use it in areas of the car,
[01:05:14.900 -> 01:05:19.460] firstly, that aren't really structurally an issue.
[01:05:19.460 -> 01:05:21.620] And I believe it's to do with the,
[01:05:21.620 -> 01:05:26.240] you know, those rotating advertising hoardings that they've got on the side of the
[01:05:26.240 -> 01:05:31.120] cars, the little panels. I believe that's what they're making this from to start with,
[01:05:31.920 -> 01:05:38.720] but it is something that they can scale a little bit more in terms of perhaps body work. I think
[01:05:38.720 -> 01:05:47.500] from an interesting point of view, I think there's a limit to where this can be utilized.
[01:05:47.500 -> 01:05:52.700] So if it's a stressed member, then it's going to need to be something that is produced from scratch.
[01:05:52.700 -> 01:05:59.700] Whereas things like front wing flaps or a side pod panel, etc.
[01:05:59.700 -> 01:06:05.860] can obviously be made from a recycled component for argument's sake.
[01:06:05.860 -> 01:06:09.480] So I think it's an interesting thing with McLaren
[01:06:09.480 -> 01:06:10.840] that as you've already mentioned,
[01:06:10.840 -> 01:06:13.140] they tend to head in this direction.
[01:06:13.140 -> 01:06:16.440] And I don't think it is fantastical in many ways
[01:06:16.440 -> 01:06:21.340] in terms of the approach that they're gonna take
[01:06:21.340 -> 01:06:24.160] is something that is out of this world,
[01:06:24.160 -> 01:06:26.740] but it's something that will add up over time.
[01:06:26.960 -> 01:06:30.120] And if it continues to be used, then other teams will bring,
[01:06:30.340 -> 01:06:32.260] will see a benefit from it.
[01:06:32.260 -> 01:06:36.120] And obviously the cost implication, and when you're under cost cap, you've
[01:06:36.120 -> 01:06:42.760] got to find ways to improve things from a cost side of the coin.
[01:06:42.760 -> 01:06:46.460] So I think that is obviously on their mind.
[01:06:46.780 -> 01:06:53.260] And that is an area where all of the teams will look at in the future, not
[01:06:53.260 -> 01:06:58.580] only from a green point of view, but from a, you know, from a monetary point of view.
[01:06:59.020 -> 01:06:59.300] Yeah.
[01:06:59.380 -> 01:07:04.160] Well, I mean, and I hate to bring up road relevance, but it does seem like one of
[01:07:04.160 -> 01:07:09.160] those things, like one of the biggest issues with using carbon fiber in road cars is it's expensive
[01:07:09.160 -> 01:07:15.060] to lay it up, but if you've got it and you can recycle it, then while you save weight
[01:07:15.060 -> 01:07:18.100] on a car, then you get better fuel mileage, you get a better performance.
[01:07:18.100 -> 01:07:20.000] There's a lot of good that will come out of it.
[01:07:20.480 -> 01:07:21.720] I want to finish with tires.
[01:07:23.920 -> 01:07:24.480] Of course.
[01:07:25.920 -> 01:07:33.840] And, and I just, it doesn't have to be the longest explanation, but we saw, we've seen Ferrari
[01:07:33.840 -> 01:07:39.680] be very positive about getting on top of their tire degradation.
[01:07:39.680 -> 01:07:46.180] And usually that means that they figured out some kind of some kind of COP thing where
[01:07:46.180 -> 01:07:49.420] they've got their aero pressure now sorted out or they've got their
[01:07:49.420 -> 01:07:53.300] mechanical balance, their center of gravity worked out a little bit better.
[01:07:53.300 -> 01:07:59.180] But they really very specifically mentioned their energy deployment was
[01:07:59.180 -> 01:08:13.000] actually causing them a great deal of hassle with their tire degradation. And I wondered if, before we go, you could shed any insight on how those things interplay.
[01:08:13.000 -> 01:08:23.000] Yeah, so obviously, to borrow from a previous era, think of turbo lag and obviously the fact that you would
[01:08:23.000 -> 01:08:26.400] wait and wait and wait and wait for
[01:08:26.400 -> 01:08:27.880] the turbo to finally spool up.
[01:08:27.880 -> 01:08:29.560] Lose your eyes and think of turbo lag.
[01:08:29.560 -> 01:08:32.520] I don't know why I want to say that, but I just had to.
[01:08:32.520 -> 01:08:39.240] I remember Santa Pod very clearly with turbo lag and the problems that I had setting up
[01:08:39.240 -> 01:08:40.240] a car one day.
[01:08:40.240 -> 01:08:46.720] But yeah, so huge amounts of turbo lag, all of a sudden you get all that boost
[01:08:46.760 -> 01:08:51.100] all at once, and suddenly you're breaking traction because you've got
[01:08:51.100 -> 01:08:54.080] too much performance all at once.
[01:08:54.360 -> 01:08:59.320] And I think this is perhaps where Ferrari have found that they had issues, is
[01:08:59.360 -> 01:09:04.000] traction, tractability under certain scenarios.
[01:09:09.840 -> 01:09:14.480] Tractability under certain scenarios and so by being able to dial things back slightly not only are they going to then improve the performance from a tire deck point of view they're improving lap
[01:09:14.480 -> 01:09:20.080] time performance because they're not suddenly sliding with the tires as much and they're also
[01:09:20.080 -> 01:09:26.400] improving their deployment because they've got then more energy at the top end because they've not spent as much in the lower end.
[01:09:26.560 -> 01:09:32.100] So it's sort of a payback scenario where you you're gaining from doing
[01:09:32.100 -> 01:09:34.000] something a little bit less at the start.
[01:09:34.360 -> 01:09:38.160] And I think that's probably where we're looking at with Ferrari in terms of the
[01:09:38.160 -> 01:09:43.080] energy deployment is that they've just found a better way of deploying, um,
[01:09:43.120 -> 01:09:46.040] throughout a certain stage in the, you know, the sort
[01:09:46.040 -> 01:09:47.040] of rev range.
[01:09:47.040 -> 01:09:48.040] Okay.
[01:09:48.040 -> 01:09:53.280] Well, I got to say, thanks so much for taking the time to come and explain these things
[01:09:53.280 -> 01:09:57.640] to us and answer my ridiculous multi-part questions.
[01:09:57.640 -> 01:09:59.600] Where can we find you these days?
[01:09:59.600 -> 01:10:05.880] Well, the best place to find me is the place that I think is called X now, is it?
[01:10:05.880 -> 01:10:07.400] Or is it still called Twitter?
[01:10:07.400 -> 01:10:09.040] I mean, I still call it Twitter.
[01:10:09.040 -> 01:10:11.160] I've still got it as the Twitter app.
[01:10:11.160 -> 01:10:13.920] So you know, you know us old people.
[01:10:13.920 -> 01:10:16.800] It's named whatever it was named when I learned it the first time.
[01:10:16.800 -> 01:10:20.160] I don't care how many times you change it afterwards.
[01:10:20.160 -> 01:10:25.720] So yeah, I'm Summers F1 on Twitter or X or whatever it's called this week. Elon.
[01:10:26.440 -> 01:10:26.480] Love it.
[01:10:32.240 -> 01:10:36.520] As for me, I'm at Matt PT 55 on Twitter's or the X's or whatever, as you said, you want to call it and pretty much every other social media outlet, except for
[01:10:36.520 -> 01:10:38.540] tech doc for some reason, I don't know why.
[01:10:39.120 -> 01:10:43.120] And, um, I just want to say thanks everyone for listening and remind you
[01:10:43.120 -> 01:10:47.680] that we will see you around 9.30pm UK time
[01:10:47.680 -> 01:10:50.400] subtract 5 if you're on the East Coast like me
[01:10:50.400 -> 01:10:54.880] for the live review of the Circuit of the Americas Grand Prix
[01:10:54.880 -> 01:10:58.880] and until then, talk tires, think aero, and remember
[01:10:58.880 -> 01:11:02.240] little worlds make bigger worlds, and so on to viscosity.
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[01:12:38.040 -> 01:12:41.000] A cast powers, the world's best podcasts.
[01:12:41.760 -> 01:12:43.080] Here's the show that we recommend.
[01:12:47.000 -> 01:12:49.640] Hello. I'm Danny Pellegrino, host of the
[01:12:49.640 -> 01:12:55.720] Everything Iconic podcast. And this holiday season, I'm once again joined by my buddy,
[01:12:55.720 -> 01:12:57.240] writer and comedian Jenna Brister.
[01:12:57.240 -> 01:12:58.560] Jenna Brister Hey, Danny, happy holidays.
[01:12:58.560 -> 01:13:00.240] Danny Pellegrino Happy holidays. Is it too early?
[01:13:00.240 -> 01:13:01.240] Jenna Brister No, never.
[01:13:01.240 -> 01:13:03.600] Danny Pellegrino Never, never. That's right. And season five
[01:13:03.600 -> 01:13:07.760] of our holiday movie recap podcast, A Very Merry Iconic Podcast, we'll
[01:13:07.760 -> 01:13:10.500] be covering all of your Christmas favorites.
[01:13:10.500 -> 01:13:13.320] This year we're covering Christmas story, The Grinch.
[01:13:13.320 -> 01:13:14.320] The Grinch again.
[01:13:14.320 -> 01:13:15.320] Again.
[01:13:15.320 -> 01:13:16.320] Because we have more thoughts.
[01:13:16.320 -> 01:13:18.320] We always have more thoughts on that Grinch monster.
[01:13:18.320 -> 01:13:19.320] Love him.
[01:13:19.320 -> 01:13:20.320] That's right.
[01:13:20.320 -> 01:13:23.840] We're breaking down the seasonal films while taking plenty of detours along the way.
[01:13:23.840 -> 01:13:24.840] So grab your cocoa.
[01:13:24.840 -> 01:13:28.160] Grab your peppermint schnapps, meet us by the fire. For our exact schedule
[01:13:28.160 -> 01:13:32.780] you can follow us on Instagram at a very merry iconic podcast. It's finally that
[01:13:32.780 -> 01:13:36.920] time! So get in the holiday spirit with a very merry iconic podcast available
[01:13:36.920 -> 01:13:40.240] wherever you listen to podcasts.
[01:13:42.520 -> 01:13:49.000] ACAST helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere.
[01:13:49.000 -> 01:13:50.000] Acast.com