Today I become a year older. It is not a significant birthday, in the sense that I reach a nice round number of years, unless you are one of those people who attach especial importance to prime numbers; and in any case, I am not one of those to celebrate birthdays overmuch. Devoted readers may remember my acknowledgement of the passing of 20,000 days a few years ago – it’s
here if you want to go and look, so the fact of my birthday is not a ‘huge big deal’ in my life.
However, I am surprised how many people choose to use the moment to say ‘many happy returns’ on facebook – and I have to say I am also flattered. Perhaps here and now is a good opportunity to thank you for your good wishes – and I hope that I go on to have many more happy birthdays! A wonderful feature of our humanity is that we can choose to pour out goodwill towards our fellow man – simple acts of kindness, if you will.
Yet although we are broadly good-natured animals, there seem to be many occasions when we think only of ourselves and what the outcome will be for us as individuals. With the upcoming referendum in the UK and presidential elections in the US, we have the opportunity to make a choice that will benefit our respective nations – at least one would hope so. More often than not, it simply boils down to a question of whether one can expect to be better off in one situation or another.
None of this has anything to do with motor-racing, of course. But I do not live such a one-dimensional life as you might think. Well, not quite. The point here – as I reflect that another year gone by means another year closer to the grave – is to set a context, and for that you need also to read my previous post speculating on where we might be in six to eight years’ time.
There are currently - without even considering series at a national level - at least four organisations running races for GT3 cars: SRO, the ACO, Creventic and IMSA. There are others, but let’s not get bogged down in detail. Then there is the GTE class of the World Endurance Championship and GT-LM in the IMSA-organised series in the USA.
Now it may be that my mind’s eye has been put a little out-of-focus by a couple of glasses of claret to celebrate my advancing years, but I can envisage a time when there will be a single, worldwide definition for a racing grand tourer. The trouble is that those two (“honestly, officer!”) glasses of wine have obscured the two big obstacles: co-ordination and goodwill.
It strikes me that both of these have to do with the personalities involved: for once I don’t mean the drivers, but the organising bodies. One thing that is remarkable about the current state of GT racing is the cross-over of drivers and teams between the various series and championships. The enthusiasm for participation in endurance events is refreshing, although politics is never far away, it is seldom visible on the surface.
As I have mentioned before, some manufacturers are spending a great deal of money, as are sponsors and some wealthy individuals who are participating. The ones who are not spending any money are the organisers. Their attitude seems to echo that of the unsavoury side of human nature: what’s in it for me?
There is nothing really wrong with this, of course: Darwinism is based on much the same approach, but am I alone in detecting antagonism where there could so easily be co-operation? Competition may improve the breed, but it also divides the market. In a perfect world, such division would not have to exist, and my vision of unity might be possible. Sadly, that’s not the way it is and I don’t see how things will change while there are people out there whose jobs and income depend on the sport. But I fear that is the problem with all professional sport.
Enough of this – it’s time to get on with some racing. And possibly a glass of port.
Friday, 11 March 2016
Monday, 29 February 2016
Speculation about the distant future...
I’m not really one to peer into crystal balls and make predictions about the future, but I do listen to and read what a lot of people are saying and writing about motorsport, whether it is Formula 1, WEC, GT or whatever. I also spend time on my own thinking about those things and the things that history can teach us. One thing that has been gnawing away at me recently is where we might be in, say, eight to ten years’ time. I was half-considering a blog post on the subject, and then this photo from Martin Spetz was posted on twitter – with a caption by Graham Goodwin (the editor of www.dailysportscar.com): “Spot the prototype!” - so here I go:
Although I would hate to see it happen, and at the moment I’ll admit it seems extremely unlikely, but just suppose that the LMP1 technology race self-destructs: that Porsche, Audi and Toyota move out, leaving the playing field to the privateers. Meanwhile, the manufacturers that have been pouring their multi-million dollar R&D budgets into GT programmes want more exposure on the world stage, particularly at Le Mans.
Then reflect on the extent to which sportscar racing categories are already controlled by regulation, and consider how difficult it would be – or not – for the FIA Endurance Committee to come up with a formula that made a full-house manufacturer GT car able to compete with a privately-entered prototype over a long distance race.
It’s not a fanciful possibility. Twenty years or so ago, readers may recall – and if you’re too young, then buy Quentin Spurring’s “Official History” for the 1990-1999 decade – there was such a balance of performance. The Dauer 962 was a GT car (officially), and won the 24 hours in 1994 ahead of prototype opposition from Toyota. In 1996, the Joest-entered TWR-Porsche beat the works 911 GT1’s. In between, of course, a McLaren (entered ‘privately’) triumphed against Yves Courage’s prototype in the hands of Mario Andretti, Eric Hélary and Bob Wollek.
Balancing performance has come a long way in twenty years, and I don’t see any good reason why the ‘privateer prototype’ class that we have in the WEC, along with the American IMSA prototype class, should not be restricted (by different amounts) so that a less-restricted GT class could be within 5% of each other’s lap time. That 5% difference could then be equalised by allowing the GT cars a larger fuel tank and faster refuelling procedures.
Of course, I’m not suggesting that this is going to happen in 2017, or even in 2018. But it strikes me that a solution has to be found to the two struggles going on in endurance racing at the moment: first that the privateer wants to enter races with more than just a class full of privateers as competition; and second, that there seems to be as much or more interest from manufacturer teams in GT racing than in prototypes.
Although Toyota, Audi and Porsche claim relevance of technology transfer from race-track to road car, both Audi and Porsche are already active in the GT3/GTE arena, and Toyotas competes successfully in GT500 racing in Japan with the Lexus brand and surely would not be slow in converting to a new, uprated GT class on the world stage?
Just imagine the prospect: here is a purely speculative entry list for the 2022 Le Mans 24 hour race:
Inevitably, I fear, there would be debate about whether manufacturer teams should be allowed in the Prototype class. My suggestion would be that it should be restricted to private entries, but that becomes a difficult definition to regulate, especially when things as important as Le Mans victories are concerned. But then Le Mans’ history is littered with examples of works entries masquerading as privateers (as 1995 and 1996 show), so maybe we shouldn’t get too precious about this.
There is also the whole matter of crew composition, amateur drivers and grading, which I have deliberately avoided. Despite my misgivings, there are quite simply not enough world-class drivers available to crew fifty or sixty cars with three drivers per car – so non-professional drivers will inevitably be part of endurance racing for many years to come. Rightly so, for herein lies a good deal of the attraction of the place and the event.
The important aspect of this vision is that while the concept of multi-class racing has been key to the success of endurance racing over the years, it may be that – just as in the world of touring cars – equalising the top of some classes might have some benefit.
What do you think? Am I barking mad?
Although I would hate to see it happen, and at the moment I’ll admit it seems extremely unlikely, but just suppose that the LMP1 technology race self-destructs: that Porsche, Audi and Toyota move out, leaving the playing field to the privateers. Meanwhile, the manufacturers that have been pouring their multi-million dollar R&D budgets into GT programmes want more exposure on the world stage, particularly at Le Mans.
Then reflect on the extent to which sportscar racing categories are already controlled by regulation, and consider how difficult it would be – or not – for the FIA Endurance Committee to come up with a formula that made a full-house manufacturer GT car able to compete with a privately-entered prototype over a long distance race.
It’s not a fanciful possibility. Twenty years or so ago, readers may recall – and if you’re too young, then buy Quentin Spurring’s “Official History” for the 1990-1999 decade – there was such a balance of performance. The Dauer 962 was a GT car (officially), and won the 24 hours in 1994 ahead of prototype opposition from Toyota. In 1996, the Joest-entered TWR-Porsche beat the works 911 GT1’s. In between, of course, a McLaren (entered ‘privately’) triumphed against Yves Courage’s prototype in the hands of Mario Andretti, Eric Hélary and Bob Wollek.
Balancing performance has come a long way in twenty years, and I don’t see any good reason why the ‘privateer prototype’ class that we have in the WEC, along with the American IMSA prototype class, should not be restricted (by different amounts) so that a less-restricted GT class could be within 5% of each other’s lap time. That 5% difference could then be equalised by allowing the GT cars a larger fuel tank and faster refuelling procedures.
Of course, I’m not suggesting that this is going to happen in 2017, or even in 2018. But it strikes me that a solution has to be found to the two struggles going on in endurance racing at the moment: first that the privateer wants to enter races with more than just a class full of privateers as competition; and second, that there seems to be as much or more interest from manufacturer teams in GT racing than in prototypes.
Although Toyota, Audi and Porsche claim relevance of technology transfer from race-track to road car, both Audi and Porsche are already active in the GT3/GTE arena, and Toyotas competes successfully in GT500 racing in Japan with the Lexus brand and surely would not be slow in converting to a new, uprated GT class on the world stage?
Just imagine the prospect: here is a purely speculative entry list for the 2022 Le Mans 24 hour race:
| Prototypes: | GT Cars: | |
|---|---|---|
| Rebellion-Oreca | Audi | |
| Courage-Peugeot | Aston Martin | |
| Strakka-Dome | Bentley | |
| Ligier | Porsche | |
| Alpine | Lamborghini | |
| Gibson | McLaren | |
| Oreca | Ford GT | |
| Kolles-Lotus | BMW | |
| Manor | Mercedes | |
| Mazda | Nissan | |
| Riley | Jaguar | |
| GM-Corvette | Ferrari | |
| Ginetta | TVR | |
| HPD-Honda |
Inevitably, I fear, there would be debate about whether manufacturer teams should be allowed in the Prototype class. My suggestion would be that it should be restricted to private entries, but that becomes a difficult definition to regulate, especially when things as important as Le Mans victories are concerned. But then Le Mans’ history is littered with examples of works entries masquerading as privateers (as 1995 and 1996 show), so maybe we shouldn’t get too precious about this.
There is also the whole matter of crew composition, amateur drivers and grading, which I have deliberately avoided. Despite my misgivings, there are quite simply not enough world-class drivers available to crew fifty or sixty cars with three drivers per car – so non-professional drivers will inevitably be part of endurance racing for many years to come. Rightly so, for herein lies a good deal of the attraction of the place and the event.
The important aspect of this vision is that while the concept of multi-class racing has been key to the success of endurance racing over the years, it may be that – just as in the world of touring cars – equalising the top of some classes might have some benefit.
What do you think? Am I barking mad?
Wednesday, 17 February 2016
Dubai, Daytona and Bathurst... oh, and Monza!
I often seem to find myself apologising for not posting more on this blog, but regular readers – if there are any left – will know that my priorities lie elsewhere than posting idle chatter here.
Having been fortunate enough to spend a very enjoyable time in Dubai commentating for radiolemans.com for the Hankook-sponsored 24-hour race, I dug into the data and posted an analysis of that race on dailysportscar.com. And although I did not travel to either Daytona for the Rolex 24-hour race or to Bathurst for the Liqui-Moly 12 hours, I was able to get hold of similar amounts of data for each of those races, from which I could provide further articles for dailysportscar. Writing anything here then seemed a little superfluous – or else too much like hard work! But I was then inspired by the “GT Debate” on Midweek Motorsport to ponder further on the wisdom of having three races in a four-week period on three different continents (none of them Europe). However, the fact that only two drivers participated in all three is perhaps a good indication that there is sufficient interest across the world for such an intense start to the season.
Whilst the sixty hours of racing certainly meant a hectic travel schedule for some, the internet and live streaming provided the opportunity for others – and I was one of them – to observe the unfolding of events from the comfort of their homes. Those who did stay up witnessed some first-class racing and excellent entertainment.
Helped by the benefit of hindsight, not to mention a fair old distance, I thought I would see what lessons we might be able to draw by stepping back and looking at all three races together. A “long view from afar”, if you see what I mean.
For the purposes of comparing like with like (more or less), and sticking to the principle of looking only at GT3 racing, I am only going to consider the A6 (Pro and Am) class from Dubai, the GTD class from Daytona and class A (AP and AA) at Bathurst.
First, a reminder of the top six from each race.
I’m not really sure what conclusions to draw from this, since each race had very different entries, but if one were to award a “cup” for the best manufacturer, you’d have to work hard to convince me that it shouldn’t be presented to Audi, closely followed by Mercedes.
But spare a moment to look at the list of manufacturers that is represented in that list of top six finishers… ten altogether. Then notice that Ferrari isn’t even on the list!
All three races run to rather different regulations, and on rather different types of track, but nevertheless, I thought it would be fun to compare the total distance achieved by the winners in each race. To make matters fair, I have multiplied the winner’s distance at Bathurst by two, as it was only a twelve-hour race!
The final row shows each distance as a percentage of the distance covered at Daytona. (Note that this is the race distance achieved by the class-winning Magnus Audi, not the ESM Ligier-HPD of the overall winners. The ESM team completed 736 laps in the 24 hours, a distance of 4,216.7 km, or 104.7% of the distance covered by the leading GTD car.)
One of the things that makes endurance racing so fascinating is that there are so many elements to success. In addition to having a fast car, you need to have a crew of drivers who can work together, you need to be efficient in the pits, and you need the car to be reliable. Not surprisingly, the way that the regulations work on pit stops is different in each race, but nevertheless, it is interesting to compare the total time spent in the pits by the winning car in each of the three races:
Dubai: 1h 23m 20s (25 stops, 4 drivers, 17 changes of driver)
Daytona: 40m 58s (28 stops, 4 drivers, 11 changes of driver)
Bathurst: 18m 32.371 (13 stops, 3 drivers, 5 changes of driver)
More than anything else, this really just goes to show the difference in fuelling regulations – Dubai using the separate refuelling area, and Daytona stipulating a slower refuelling rate in order separate the GT-LM cars from the GTD entries. What it does demonstrate is that to win any of these races you need to have a fault-free run… but of course, at Bathurst, the winning McLaren’s run was anything but perfect: the Nissan that finished 1.276s behind stopped 11 times for 13m 54s and the fourth-placed Audi made only 8 stops, spent only 11m 09s in the pit lane and still finished on the lead lap!
But while not stopping (for too long) is important, motor-racing is supposed to be all about speed, isn’t it? So let’s just check out the fastest lap times around each circuit: ultimately, it should be that which plays the largest part in defining which of the races goes the furthest.
Speed of fastest lap:
Dubai: 1m 58.712s (163.727 km/h) – 84.0%
Daytona: 1m 45.873s (194.812 km/h) – 100%
Bathurst: 2m 01.567s (183.987 km/h) – 94.4%
It is not just setting a fast lap time, though. Most people reading this know that I will go to my grave bleating about average lap times, but one means of calculating this for the whole race (a method that I seldom use, I must admit) is to take the distance covered and divide it by the total time spent on the track (as opposed to being in the pits).
This give the following - call it the winner’s average speed on track:
Dubai: 139.28 km/h (80.7%)
Daytona: 172.50 km/h (100%)
Bathurst: 157.59 km/h (91.4%)
But rather than measuring the speed on the track, this is actually measuring the amount of time that the race is neutralised: either by the dreaded Safety Car, or – in the case of Dubai – of the Code-60 periods.
So how long was each race under full course caution? In the table below, don’t forget that Bathurst is only 12 hours. Here are the details of the Race Neutralisations at each event:
Dubai: 4h 20m 09s (18% of race) / 545 laps green (93% of race laps)
Daytona: 5h 10m 52s (22%) / 593 laps green (84% of race laps)
Bathurst: 3h 04m 31s (26%) / 245 laps green (82% of race laps)
It is interesting – but also obvious, when you think about it – that the percentage of race laps lost is different from the percentage of time spent under caution. At Dubai the average speed under caution is 60km/h, at Bathurst around 90km/h and about 120km/h at Daytona behind a Safety Car.
There is a strong argument that we now have a golden era for GT racing, worldwide. The last time that it was so popular was probably in the early 1990’s when prototype racing self-destructed and GTs – led by the BPR Organisation – were the only game in town. But perhaps more momentous were the Group 5 GT cars of the late 1970’s: when ‘silhouette-style’ racers were produced by specialists, but prompted by factory support from Ford, BMW, Lancia and Porsche. Then, as now, major manufacturers saw the benefit of racing to improve the image of the breed.
It also gives me an excuse to dig out some photos from my collection: stirring stuff, don’t you agree? I wish I had taken my camera to more race meetings - somehow it was just a bit too much clutter - otherwise there would certainly be a Zakspeed Capri here...
/
In closing, let me offer you a somewhat whimsical thought on those first three races of the year. With 98 cars taking the start in Dubai, 54 at Daytona and 36 in Bathurst an awful lot of competitive miles were covered in the sixty hours that comprised those races.
Total distance covered:
Dubai: 232,556km
Daytona: 186,018km
Bathurst: 46,349km
Total: 464,924km
To try and put that number into perspective, consider that the moon is, on average, 384,400km away from the Earth. Or that the circumference of Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, is 439,264km. The competitors in the first three races of the year, went – in total – further than either of those!
Having been fortunate enough to spend a very enjoyable time in Dubai commentating for radiolemans.com for the Hankook-sponsored 24-hour race, I dug into the data and posted an analysis of that race on dailysportscar.com. And although I did not travel to either Daytona for the Rolex 24-hour race or to Bathurst for the Liqui-Moly 12 hours, I was able to get hold of similar amounts of data for each of those races, from which I could provide further articles for dailysportscar. Writing anything here then seemed a little superfluous – or else too much like hard work! But I was then inspired by the “GT Debate” on Midweek Motorsport to ponder further on the wisdom of having three races in a four-week period on three different continents (none of them Europe). However, the fact that only two drivers participated in all three is perhaps a good indication that there is sufficient interest across the world for such an intense start to the season.
Whilst the sixty hours of racing certainly meant a hectic travel schedule for some, the internet and live streaming provided the opportunity for others – and I was one of them – to observe the unfolding of events from the comfort of their homes. Those who did stay up witnessed some first-class racing and excellent entertainment.
Helped by the benefit of hindsight, not to mention a fair old distance, I thought I would see what lessons we might be able to draw by stepping back and looking at all three races together. A “long view from afar”, if you see what I mean.
For the purposes of comparing like with like (more or less), and sticking to the principle of looking only at GT3 racing, I am only going to consider the A6 (Pro and Am) class from Dubai, the GTD class from Daytona and class A (AP and AA) at Bathurst.
First, a reminder of the top six from each race.
| Pos. | Dubai | Daytona | Bathurst |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Audi (WRT) | Audi (Magnus) | McLaren |
| 2 | Mercedes(Blk Falcon) | Porsche | Nissan |
| 3 | Audi (ABT) | Dodge Viper | Bentley Continental |
| 4 | Mercedes (Hofor) | Aston Martin | Audi (Phoenix) |
| 5 | Audi (Optimum) | Lamborghini | Mercedes (Erebus) |
| 6 | Mercedes (PreciSpark) | BMW | Audi (GT) |
I’m not really sure what conclusions to draw from this, since each race had very different entries, but if one were to award a “cup” for the best manufacturer, you’d have to work hard to convince me that it shouldn’t be presented to Audi, closely followed by Mercedes.
But spare a moment to look at the list of manufacturers that is represented in that list of top six finishers… ten altogether. Then notice that Ferrari isn’t even on the list!
All three races run to rather different regulations, and on rather different types of track, but nevertheless, I thought it would be fun to compare the total distance achieved by the winners in each race. To make matters fair, I have multiplied the winner’s distance at Bathurst by two, as it was only a twelve-hour race!
| Dubai | Daytona | Bathurst *2 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Distance km | 3,174.6 | 4,027.7 | 3,690.6 |
| Distance miles | 1,972.6 | 2,502.7 | 2,293.2 |
| Percentage | 78.8% | 100% | 91.6% |
The final row shows each distance as a percentage of the distance covered at Daytona. (Note that this is the race distance achieved by the class-winning Magnus Audi, not the ESM Ligier-HPD of the overall winners. The ESM team completed 736 laps in the 24 hours, a distance of 4,216.7 km, or 104.7% of the distance covered by the leading GTD car.)
One of the things that makes endurance racing so fascinating is that there are so many elements to success. In addition to having a fast car, you need to have a crew of drivers who can work together, you need to be efficient in the pits, and you need the car to be reliable. Not surprisingly, the way that the regulations work on pit stops is different in each race, but nevertheless, it is interesting to compare the total time spent in the pits by the winning car in each of the three races:
Dubai: 1h 23m 20s (25 stops, 4 drivers, 17 changes of driver)
Daytona: 40m 58s (28 stops, 4 drivers, 11 changes of driver)
Bathurst: 18m 32.371 (13 stops, 3 drivers, 5 changes of driver)
More than anything else, this really just goes to show the difference in fuelling regulations – Dubai using the separate refuelling area, and Daytona stipulating a slower refuelling rate in order separate the GT-LM cars from the GTD entries. What it does demonstrate is that to win any of these races you need to have a fault-free run… but of course, at Bathurst, the winning McLaren’s run was anything but perfect: the Nissan that finished 1.276s behind stopped 11 times for 13m 54s and the fourth-placed Audi made only 8 stops, spent only 11m 09s in the pit lane and still finished on the lead lap!
But while not stopping (for too long) is important, motor-racing is supposed to be all about speed, isn’t it? So let’s just check out the fastest lap times around each circuit: ultimately, it should be that which plays the largest part in defining which of the races goes the furthest.
Speed of fastest lap:
Dubai: 1m 58.712s (163.727 km/h) – 84.0%
Daytona: 1m 45.873s (194.812 km/h) – 100%
Bathurst: 2m 01.567s (183.987 km/h) – 94.4%
It is not just setting a fast lap time, though. Most people reading this know that I will go to my grave bleating about average lap times, but one means of calculating this for the whole race (a method that I seldom use, I must admit) is to take the distance covered and divide it by the total time spent on the track (as opposed to being in the pits).
This give the following - call it the winner’s average speed on track:
Dubai: 139.28 km/h (80.7%)
Daytona: 172.50 km/h (100%)
Bathurst: 157.59 km/h (91.4%)
But rather than measuring the speed on the track, this is actually measuring the amount of time that the race is neutralised: either by the dreaded Safety Car, or – in the case of Dubai – of the Code-60 periods.
So how long was each race under full course caution? In the table below, don’t forget that Bathurst is only 12 hours. Here are the details of the Race Neutralisations at each event:
Dubai: 4h 20m 09s (18% of race) / 545 laps green (93% of race laps)
Daytona: 5h 10m 52s (22%) / 593 laps green (84% of race laps)
Bathurst: 3h 04m 31s (26%) / 245 laps green (82% of race laps)
It is interesting – but also obvious, when you think about it – that the percentage of race laps lost is different from the percentage of time spent under caution. At Dubai the average speed under caution is 60km/h, at Bathurst around 90km/h and about 120km/h at Daytona behind a Safety Car.
There is a strong argument that we now have a golden era for GT racing, worldwide. The last time that it was so popular was probably in the early 1990’s when prototype racing self-destructed and GTs – led by the BPR Organisation – were the only game in town. But perhaps more momentous were the Group 5 GT cars of the late 1970’s: when ‘silhouette-style’ racers were produced by specialists, but prompted by factory support from Ford, BMW, Lancia and Porsche. Then, as now, major manufacturers saw the benefit of racing to improve the image of the breed.
It also gives me an excuse to dig out some photos from my collection: stirring stuff, don’t you agree? I wish I had taken my camera to more race meetings - somehow it was just a bit too much clutter - otherwise there would certainly be a Zakspeed Capri here...
/
In closing, let me offer you a somewhat whimsical thought on those first three races of the year. With 98 cars taking the start in Dubai, 54 at Daytona and 36 in Bathurst an awful lot of competitive miles were covered in the sixty hours that comprised those races.
Total distance covered:
Dubai: 232,556km
Daytona: 186,018km
Bathurst: 46,349km
Total: 464,924km
To try and put that number into perspective, consider that the moon is, on average, 384,400km away from the Earth. Or that the circumference of Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, is 439,264km. The competitors in the first three races of the year, went – in total – further than either of those!
Friday, 18 December 2015
Christmas Rumblings from Ebenezer Truswell...
There are 21 Formula 1 Grands Prix scheduled for 2016. There are nine rounds in the WEC. If you are so minded, you could easily find eight 24 hour races (Le Mans, Spa, Nürburgring, Daytona, Dubai, Silverstone, Paul Ricard, Barcelona,) to go to and a three proper 12 hour races (Bathurst, Sebring, Sepang), not to mention the ‘split’ races at Mugello, Zandvoort, Brno, and Abu Dhabi. And those are all top line, international events, not merely national races for production cars. It’s enough. In fact it is too much. The ELMS is expanding to six races, the US sportscar season has twelve rounds and we are in the middle (you may have missed it) of a four-round Asian Le Mans [Winter] Series.
Then there are the ten rounds of the Blancpain GT Series, half of which are billed as “Endurance” races, held over three hours or more. That is more than fifty races and I have not even mentioned British GT, the GT-tour, VLN, ADAC GT, Dutch Supercar or Japanese Super GT. Or the Thunderhill 25-hour race, which seems also to be growing in stature.
I get the feeling these days of a helter-skelter: a headlong rush from one race to another, with no time to reflect between races. If that’s my view as an outsider, then for those involved, whether it be to prepare the cars, to organise the travel and hotels, or to manage, run and direct the races themselves, it is surely only a stone’s throw away from utter chaos.
Does it have to be this way? Can everyone truly hope to have a bigger slice of every cake? I suppose it depends on your point of view. For teams running cars, for organising bodies selling airtime to TV stations, then yes, having more races means more revenue, more turnover, more profit.
For professional drivers, of course, it means more earning opportunities and for gentleman drivers, more chances to indulge in their hobby, even if that means spending more money to do so.
The difficulty that I have with it all is that the abundance of racing diminishes the significance of individual events. Forgive me if I digress for a moment. Our local Rotary Club organises an annual firework display in a park close to our house. We went along this year, paid our £14 to get in, and were treated to a veritable extravaganza. It was good entertainment, thoroughly enjoyed by all the family, and it was made all the more special by the fact that, although the Rotary Club organises it annually, we had missed the last two events.
The point is that the intervening 36 months served to make the event, when we saw it, all the more special. There would be nothing (except some local bye-laws and an uncooperative council, probably) to stop them organising fireworks every Saturday night. But where would be the fun in that? What would be special about going along to something that you can see every week?
It is possible, though, that this is just me, failing to move with the times. I must admit I find the current trend towards social media deeply unsettling, a constant distraction as the appetite for the latest news grows - consumers seem to want less and less content, more and more often. Maybe I am in the minority, shuddering at the words of that Wizzard song: “I wish it could be Christmas every day!”
But all this proliferation may be no bad thing. If it is a case of suppliers providing what the market demands, then is it not exceedingly curmudgeonly of me to groan a little? In many ways I’m all in favour of giving the market what it wants, but then again, there are times when a little restraint can be a good thing. Like at Christmas, when, as my father used to say: “moderation in all things”; although I think it was Oscar Wilde who added “… including moderation”!
Today it seems to me there is a tendency to react (especially through social media outlets) rather than reflect – to think fast rather than to think deeply. The world today is seen through the judgemental lens of a smart phone rather than the eye of wisdom and empathy.
Anyway, to all my readers, merry Christmas: may it be a joyful time of year for you all, and may 2016 live up to our hopes and not down to our fears!
Then there are the ten rounds of the Blancpain GT Series, half of which are billed as “Endurance” races, held over three hours or more. That is more than fifty races and I have not even mentioned British GT, the GT-tour, VLN, ADAC GT, Dutch Supercar or Japanese Super GT. Or the Thunderhill 25-hour race, which seems also to be growing in stature.
I get the feeling these days of a helter-skelter: a headlong rush from one race to another, with no time to reflect between races. If that’s my view as an outsider, then for those involved, whether it be to prepare the cars, to organise the travel and hotels, or to manage, run and direct the races themselves, it is surely only a stone’s throw away from utter chaos.
Does it have to be this way? Can everyone truly hope to have a bigger slice of every cake? I suppose it depends on your point of view. For teams running cars, for organising bodies selling airtime to TV stations, then yes, having more races means more revenue, more turnover, more profit.
For professional drivers, of course, it means more earning opportunities and for gentleman drivers, more chances to indulge in their hobby, even if that means spending more money to do so.
The difficulty that I have with it all is that the abundance of racing diminishes the significance of individual events. Forgive me if I digress for a moment. Our local Rotary Club organises an annual firework display in a park close to our house. We went along this year, paid our £14 to get in, and were treated to a veritable extravaganza. It was good entertainment, thoroughly enjoyed by all the family, and it was made all the more special by the fact that, although the Rotary Club organises it annually, we had missed the last two events.
The point is that the intervening 36 months served to make the event, when we saw it, all the more special. There would be nothing (except some local bye-laws and an uncooperative council, probably) to stop them organising fireworks every Saturday night. But where would be the fun in that? What would be special about going along to something that you can see every week?
It is possible, though, that this is just me, failing to move with the times. I must admit I find the current trend towards social media deeply unsettling, a constant distraction as the appetite for the latest news grows - consumers seem to want less and less content, more and more often. Maybe I am in the minority, shuddering at the words of that Wizzard song: “I wish it could be Christmas every day!”
But all this proliferation may be no bad thing. If it is a case of suppliers providing what the market demands, then is it not exceedingly curmudgeonly of me to groan a little? In many ways I’m all in favour of giving the market what it wants, but then again, there are times when a little restraint can be a good thing. Like at Christmas, when, as my father used to say: “moderation in all things”; although I think it was Oscar Wilde who added “… including moderation”!
Today it seems to me there is a tendency to react (especially through social media outlets) rather than reflect – to think fast rather than to think deeply. The world today is seen through the judgemental lens of a smart phone rather than the eye of wisdom and empathy.
Anyway, to all my readers, merry Christmas: may it be a joyful time of year for you all, and may 2016 live up to our hopes and not down to our fears!
Tuesday, 8 December 2015
Pausing to reflect... and speculate!
Yes – it’s that time of year again. When daylight is precious and coats, scarves and gloves are sought out of the backs of drawers. A time when bow ties make appearances and the carefree days of summer seem far away. A time for a single malt by an open fire and a reflection on the year gone by, accompanied by hot mince pies and anticipation of a bright new year ahead.
And an apology for those readers who enjoy reading my musings on this blog, that I have not been so productive of late. I try to ensure that what you will read here isn’t available anywhere else, and as there are seasonal reviews all over the place, I didn’t feel that there was necessarily much to add.
Porsche’s performance in the LMP1 class of the World Endurance Championship has been impressive by any measure, and although it saddens me to say it, Audi’s opposition was at times shambolic this year – to the extent that even if Porsche made mistakes, Audi made worse ones. Toyota have endured an even worse year, the 2015 iteration of the TS-040 being simply too slow to play a part in any battles for the lead during the season.
Here’s a view of the season that you might not have seen already:
That means that Porsche led around 78 percent of the racing laps in 2015, and Audi just 21 percent. And, averaged out across the season, one change of lead every 53m 41s. Another interesting view is to look at the outright performance potential, as defined by looking at the best 20% of green laps in each race, merging the two championship-counting cars together, and comparing with a theoretical best at each event. Note that this does not consider things like pit stop times, or car breakdowns – it looks purely at how fast the car is in the race. It also does not take into account that track conditions change over the course of a race, and that having the fastest car for the conditions is more important than having the fastest car overall.
While this raises some anomalies, which I don’t particularly want to go into here, it clearly demonstrates Porsche’s increasing dominance as the season progressed. However, Audi’s “performance potential” is not far off that of Porsche, even if that is not reflected in the number of laps led. As I have already mentioned, I feel that Audi was not the well-oiled machine of years gone by, with dodgy strategy calls and silly mistakes blunting what was anyway a challenging season.
It is tantalising to speculate on what 2016 might bring though. Cast your mind back to this time last year, when we were reflecting on a season in which Toyota won the manufacturers’ and drivers’ championships, and had a similar advantage in the closing races of the year.
Also, remember that both Porsche and Audi took a step up the MegaJoule ladder between last year and this: Porsche from 6MJ to 8MJ and Audi from 2MJ to 4MJ; Toyota remained on 6MJ. In 2016, it is safe to assume that Audi will take another step up (from 4MJ to 6MJ) and so will Toyota (from 6MJ to 8MJ). For Porsche, though, there is nowhere to go – unless the Endurance Committee surprises everyone and introduces a 10MJ class for 2016.
The point is, that the gains made by Audi and Porsche between 2014 and 2015 could quite conceivably be made by Audi and Toyota for next year. As can be seen from the “Performance” table above, you don’t need much of a performance advantage to lead a race. What you need to win a race – and indeed a championship – is to make everything work together efficiently.
If anything, the most efficient team of 2015 has been Toyota, whose cars have been generally reliable and who, as a team, has quietly gone about the business of racing without error. The absence of the media spotlight glaring on the team has probably helped, but they should have used this year to build a team spirit and understanding of the relationships within the team, which should help in 2016.
The news that all three major LMP1 manufacturers will do the whole of next season with just two cars each caused a few raised eyebrows. While I do not doubt that budgetary concerns played a significant part in the decision, I think that the logistics and organisation of a three-car team of current LMP1 Hybrids is just so complex, that the engineers at both Audi and Porsche will be heaving a quiet sigh of relief.
Accountants’ tentacles may reach deep, but the amount of money saved by not entering an extra car at Spa and Le Mans is but a drop in the ocean – you can be certain that a third car will be built; the money saved will be purely on the infrastructure to run it.
Three-car teams only arose because of the importance of Le Mans, of course. Entering a third car became a good way for teams to insure against the unpredictability of a 24-hour race. However, if endurance racing – indeed motor-racing as a whole – has learned anything over the past ten years, it is in the understanding of components, how to ‘life’ them and thus how to make the sum of those components reliable. Losing a car at Le Mans is certainly not impossible, but losing two? Of course, it happens: think of Le Mans 2011, when Audi lost the cars of both Allan McNish and Mike Rockenfeller in accidents, leaving the third car to win against three healthy Peugeots.
Since the dawn of the hybrid era, however, reliability has been extremely strong, and the argument of needing a ‘third car’ is less convincing.
Of course the other aspect is that the World Championships have become higher profile since they were introduced in 2012. Arguably, although the importance of Le Mans has not diminished, there is another bright star in the sky. A third car at Le Mans, even if it is ineligible for Manufacturer points, can end up giving its drivers points that the manufacturer would rather have scored by its other drivers – this year being a strong case in point. A point which, ultimately, can lead to distasteful manipulation of results on occasion.
And an apology for those readers who enjoy reading my musings on this blog, that I have not been so productive of late. I try to ensure that what you will read here isn’t available anywhere else, and as there are seasonal reviews all over the place, I didn’t feel that there was necessarily much to add.
Porsche’s performance in the LMP1 class of the World Endurance Championship has been impressive by any measure, and although it saddens me to say it, Audi’s opposition was at times shambolic this year – to the extent that even if Porsche made mistakes, Audi made worse ones. Toyota have endured an even worse year, the 2015 iteration of the TS-040 being simply too slow to play a part in any battles for the lead during the season.
Here’s a view of the season that you might not have seen already:
| Round | Venue | Changes of lead | Laps led Porsche | Laps led Audi | Laps led Toyota |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Silverstone | 9 | 81 | 96 | 24 |
| 2 | Spa-Francorchamps | 6 | 109 | 67 | 0 |
| 3 | Le Mans (24 hours) | 27 | 340 | 55 | 0 |
| 4 | Nürburgring | 3 | 201 | 2 | 0 |
| 5 | Austin | 4 | 185 | 0 | 0 |
| 6 | Fuji | 9 | 166 | 50 | 0 |
| 7 | Shanghai | 8 | 149 | 20 | 0 |
| 8 | Bahrain | 10 | 126 | 73 | 0 |
That means that Porsche led around 78 percent of the racing laps in 2015, and Audi just 21 percent. And, averaged out across the season, one change of lead every 53m 41s. Another interesting view is to look at the outright performance potential, as defined by looking at the best 20% of green laps in each race, merging the two championship-counting cars together, and comparing with a theoretical best at each event. Note that this does not consider things like pit stop times, or car breakdowns – it looks purely at how fast the car is in the race. It also does not take into account that track conditions change over the course of a race, and that having the fastest car for the conditions is more important than having the fastest car overall.
| Round | Venue | Performance Porsche | Performance Audi | Performance Toyota |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Silverstone | 98.8 | 100.0 | 99.0 |
| 2 | Spa | 100.0 | 99.6 | 98.2 |
| 3 | Le Mans | 99.6 | 99.9 | 98.1 |
| 4 | Nürburgring | 99.9 | 99.2 | 97.7 |
| 5 | Austin | 99.9 | 99.4 | 97.8 |
| 6 | Fuji | 99.3 | 99.7 | 98.2 |
| 7 | Shanghai | 99.8 | 99.5 | 98.1 |
| 8 | Bahrain | 99.8 | 99.8 | 98.2 |
While this raises some anomalies, which I don’t particularly want to go into here, it clearly demonstrates Porsche’s increasing dominance as the season progressed. However, Audi’s “performance potential” is not far off that of Porsche, even if that is not reflected in the number of laps led. As I have already mentioned, I feel that Audi was not the well-oiled machine of years gone by, with dodgy strategy calls and silly mistakes blunting what was anyway a challenging season.
It is tantalising to speculate on what 2016 might bring though. Cast your mind back to this time last year, when we were reflecting on a season in which Toyota won the manufacturers’ and drivers’ championships, and had a similar advantage in the closing races of the year.
Also, remember that both Porsche and Audi took a step up the MegaJoule ladder between last year and this: Porsche from 6MJ to 8MJ and Audi from 2MJ to 4MJ; Toyota remained on 6MJ. In 2016, it is safe to assume that Audi will take another step up (from 4MJ to 6MJ) and so will Toyota (from 6MJ to 8MJ). For Porsche, though, there is nowhere to go – unless the Endurance Committee surprises everyone and introduces a 10MJ class for 2016.
The point is, that the gains made by Audi and Porsche between 2014 and 2015 could quite conceivably be made by Audi and Toyota for next year. As can be seen from the “Performance” table above, you don’t need much of a performance advantage to lead a race. What you need to win a race – and indeed a championship – is to make everything work together efficiently.
If anything, the most efficient team of 2015 has been Toyota, whose cars have been generally reliable and who, as a team, has quietly gone about the business of racing without error. The absence of the media spotlight glaring on the team has probably helped, but they should have used this year to build a team spirit and understanding of the relationships within the team, which should help in 2016.
The news that all three major LMP1 manufacturers will do the whole of next season with just two cars each caused a few raised eyebrows. While I do not doubt that budgetary concerns played a significant part in the decision, I think that the logistics and organisation of a three-car team of current LMP1 Hybrids is just so complex, that the engineers at both Audi and Porsche will be heaving a quiet sigh of relief.
Accountants’ tentacles may reach deep, but the amount of money saved by not entering an extra car at Spa and Le Mans is but a drop in the ocean – you can be certain that a third car will be built; the money saved will be purely on the infrastructure to run it.
Three-car teams only arose because of the importance of Le Mans, of course. Entering a third car became a good way for teams to insure against the unpredictability of a 24-hour race. However, if endurance racing – indeed motor-racing as a whole – has learned anything over the past ten years, it is in the understanding of components, how to ‘life’ them and thus how to make the sum of those components reliable. Losing a car at Le Mans is certainly not impossible, but losing two? Of course, it happens: think of Le Mans 2011, when Audi lost the cars of both Allan McNish and Mike Rockenfeller in accidents, leaving the third car to win against three healthy Peugeots.
Since the dawn of the hybrid era, however, reliability has been extremely strong, and the argument of needing a ‘third car’ is less convincing.
Of course the other aspect is that the World Championships have become higher profile since they were introduced in 2012. Arguably, although the importance of Le Mans has not diminished, there is another bright star in the sky. A third car at Le Mans, even if it is ineligible for Manufacturer points, can end up giving its drivers points that the manufacturer would rather have scored by its other drivers – this year being a strong case in point. A point which, ultimately, can lead to distasteful manipulation of results on occasion.
Monday, 9 November 2015
Keeping Safe?
For the second time in successive races, the field started the Six Hours of Shanghai behind the Safety Car. Given the fact that the Free Practice and Qualifying sessions had all been held in dry – and in some cases, sunny – conditions, this was probably a sensible decision. The same thing happened three weeks before that in Fuji - although the rain was somewhat heavier, practice had been held on a dry track. Indeed, it was the second time in three years that the Six Hours of Fuji was started behind the Safety Car – maybe there is a lesson somewhere there for the calendar-maker?
I have written previously about starting a race behind a Safety Car and while I have to admit reservations about the purity of such a start, I suppose it is best summed up as the ‘least-worst option’. The pity of it is that 22 minutes (in the case of Shanghai) and 38 minutes (in the case of Fuji) of the 360 minutes scheduled racing were lost.
In 1977, I was at Brands Hatch for the World Championship of Makes Six Hours, which in dire conditions, had to be stopped after 37 laps. It was restarted as a 2h 45m race, once conditions had improved somewhat, but annoyingly, those first laps were deemed not to ‘count’ and the efforts of drivers in part one went unrewarded. I was standing in a puddle of ever-increasing dimensions as I waited for the decisions to be reached, and although track conditions improved towards the end of the afternoon, it was all rather dismal.
In 1982, again at Brands Hatch, again it was raining and the 1,000kms race again had to be stopped – after just nine laps. This time though, it was calculated as a two-part race, with times from the first twenty-minute part being added to the time for the rest of the race (a little over five hours) to create an aggregate result, albeit 27 laps short of the scheduled distance. This allowed Jacky Ickx (sharing with Derek Bell) to take victory, even though he didn’t manage to get past Teo Fabi’s Martini-sponsored Lancia, which won ‘on the road’, by just 1.7s, but which had finished the first race 6.4s behind the Rothman’s Porsche.
Had the rules for 1977 applied in 1982, then not only would Fabi and Patrese have won the race at Brands, but also Ickx would not have been world champion!
Although a Safety Car (then called a Pace-car) was first used at Le Mans in 1981, it took until the end of the decade before its use – to ‘neutralise’ the race – became widespread in racing across Europe. Particularly at Le Mans – for obvious reasons – but in all forms of racing: endurance racing, single-seaters, touring cars, the circumstances in which a race would be stopped became fewer and fewer. As a result, ‘aggregate’ races became consigned to history. Having the race decided ‘on the road’ became of critical importance, even if it meant that big leads were wiped out at a stroke as the Safety Car pulled onto the track. ‘Picking up the leader’ became crucial as well, of course, which meant that cars continued to circulate at racing speed, while the Safety Car driver chose his moment to accelerate. It seems to me that the aim of ‘Safety First’ was already being compromised as officialdom tried to implement safety procedures.
It wasn’t long before teams began to build the inevitable Safety Car period into their race plan, and race organisers were left playing catch-up trying to deal with the perceived unfairness that arose.
As a result, procedures became ever-more complicated, in the interests of preserving safety without compromising the race, and teams became ever-more adept in developing tactics to make the best of things. In US sportscar racing, it is rare for a Safety Car period to be less than 20 minutes – surely in this time, the race could have been stopped and restarted?
Worse though, is that different organising bodies have adopted different procedures. With a simple waved yellow flag it is easy. Drivers learn from their first race its meaning: “Great danger ahead, no overtaking, slow down, be prepared to stop.” But with a Safety Car Procedure it is not so simple. Mistakes were made: not only by drivers, but by officialdom as well.
In this year’s World Endurance Championship, there are three different and distinct ways of providing a safer environment to allow incidents that occur on the track to be handled, in addition to the ‘traditional’ yellow flag (see above), without having to resort to the dreaded ‘race stoppage’.
First, of course, there’s the Safety Car. But the procedure for using the Safety Car is different, depending whether we’re at Le Mans or not. And either case that’s different from procedures in the US, where many of the WEC drivers are occupied on non-clashing races.
Second, there’s the Full Course Yellow – similar to the so-called ‘Virtual Safety Car’ procedure in F1, but entirely different from a Safety Car procedure, in that drivers are required to keep to a blanket speed limit, imposed at the same time on the whole circuit. Theoretically at least, this should lead to ‘no bunching’, but Lewis Hamilton jeopardised even that theory by his antics at the US GP.
And third, there is the Slow Zone – again, requiring drivers to keep to a speed limit (80km/h), but only for a specific, and hopefully short, section of the track.
I hope you, dear reader, are keeping up here. Because if you’re not, then what chance the 100-odd racing drivers that take part in every round of the WEC?
At Shanghai, there were four periods of Full Course Caution, and at Fuji there were three. In three of those seven periods, pit stops were made by one or more of the Porsches and Audis that were at the sharp end of those races. Quite obviously, there is a lot to be gained from pitting during a FCY period, and if teams did not realise this initially, it is now common knowledge. Only two of these periods lasted for more than ten minutes, the rest were five minutes or less. In terms of laps, only one period was for more than three laps.
If the Safety Car is used, then the pit lane is closed for the first three laps. This rule is in place, not for safety reasons, but to avoid that some cars gain an advantage. There doesn’t seem any logical reason to me why the SC should close the pit lane, but that a FCY period should not – the advantage to be gained is identical. In fact, at Shanghai and Fuji, the SC laps were quicker than those spent under FCY conditions, so the chances of a car running out of fuel was actually greater – except for the fact, of course, that the SC was only used at the start of both races.
In the tennis match of rule-making, the ball is now in the FIA WEC Endurance Committee’s court to close this loophole and close the pit lane during a FCY period.
Although the option of a Slow Zone has been available to race director Eduardo Freitas, it has not been used since Le Mans. Bearing in mind the carnage that ensued as SZ procedures were not properly implemented - on more than one occasion - at Le Mans, one can see the wisdom of this. But, it is only by implementing these things, and learning from the experiences, that we will get to a satisfactory position.
It is interesting, that in drivers’ briefings, they are told that, in the implementation of a FCY, there is a “reaction time” element: enabling drivers (in effect) to choose the moment when they reduce speed to 80km/h. This is entirely sensible, since you don’t want to be hitting the brakes halfway through a long, high-speed corner. The main problem with the existing SZ procedure is the transition into and out of it. Preceding any Slow Zone is a yellow flag zone, through which drivers have to slow from racing speed to 80km/h. After the Slow Zone, the green flag indicates an immediate return to racing speed is possible. It is in the transition zones where the problems arise, particularly due to less-experienced drivers in some of the less powerful cars.
It seems to me that race officials need to recognise this and make suitable allowance in the procedure, to make the Slow Zone a more effective tool. At the moment it is under-utilised and wasted, in my opinion.
Familiarity with the procedure, whatever it is, undoubtedly helps, as does a clear message in driver briefings. These days, telemetry and GPS data are available to Race Control, so identifying transgressions and dangerous driving should not be as subjective an issue as in former times. If penalties for dangerous driving were draconian but fair, and safety rules and procedures were consistent, not just during a season, but across different series and championships, regardless of territory, organising body or racing discipline, then drivers would respond, and perhaps could then trusted to behave appropriately when following safety regulations.
It will never be possible to completely remove the element of chance and luck from racing. But to ensure that safety procedures commensurate with the times in which we currently live are feasible, drivers, race officials – in the control tower and on the circuit – as well as the spectators, need to know and understand what is going on. Then, and only then, will it be possible to create maximum safety with minimum disruption.
I have written previously about starting a race behind a Safety Car and while I have to admit reservations about the purity of such a start, I suppose it is best summed up as the ‘least-worst option’. The pity of it is that 22 minutes (in the case of Shanghai) and 38 minutes (in the case of Fuji) of the 360 minutes scheduled racing were lost.
In 1977, I was at Brands Hatch for the World Championship of Makes Six Hours, which in dire conditions, had to be stopped after 37 laps. It was restarted as a 2h 45m race, once conditions had improved somewhat, but annoyingly, those first laps were deemed not to ‘count’ and the efforts of drivers in part one went unrewarded. I was standing in a puddle of ever-increasing dimensions as I waited for the decisions to be reached, and although track conditions improved towards the end of the afternoon, it was all rather dismal.
In 1982, again at Brands Hatch, again it was raining and the 1,000kms race again had to be stopped – after just nine laps. This time though, it was calculated as a two-part race, with times from the first twenty-minute part being added to the time for the rest of the race (a little over five hours) to create an aggregate result, albeit 27 laps short of the scheduled distance. This allowed Jacky Ickx (sharing with Derek Bell) to take victory, even though he didn’t manage to get past Teo Fabi’s Martini-sponsored Lancia, which won ‘on the road’, by just 1.7s, but which had finished the first race 6.4s behind the Rothman’s Porsche.
Had the rules for 1977 applied in 1982, then not only would Fabi and Patrese have won the race at Brands, but also Ickx would not have been world champion!
Although a Safety Car (then called a Pace-car) was first used at Le Mans in 1981, it took until the end of the decade before its use – to ‘neutralise’ the race – became widespread in racing across Europe. Particularly at Le Mans – for obvious reasons – but in all forms of racing: endurance racing, single-seaters, touring cars, the circumstances in which a race would be stopped became fewer and fewer. As a result, ‘aggregate’ races became consigned to history. Having the race decided ‘on the road’ became of critical importance, even if it meant that big leads were wiped out at a stroke as the Safety Car pulled onto the track. ‘Picking up the leader’ became crucial as well, of course, which meant that cars continued to circulate at racing speed, while the Safety Car driver chose his moment to accelerate. It seems to me that the aim of ‘Safety First’ was already being compromised as officialdom tried to implement safety procedures.
It wasn’t long before teams began to build the inevitable Safety Car period into their race plan, and race organisers were left playing catch-up trying to deal with the perceived unfairness that arose.
As a result, procedures became ever-more complicated, in the interests of preserving safety without compromising the race, and teams became ever-more adept in developing tactics to make the best of things. In US sportscar racing, it is rare for a Safety Car period to be less than 20 minutes – surely in this time, the race could have been stopped and restarted?
Worse though, is that different organising bodies have adopted different procedures. With a simple waved yellow flag it is easy. Drivers learn from their first race its meaning: “Great danger ahead, no overtaking, slow down, be prepared to stop.” But with a Safety Car Procedure it is not so simple. Mistakes were made: not only by drivers, but by officialdom as well.
In this year’s World Endurance Championship, there are three different and distinct ways of providing a safer environment to allow incidents that occur on the track to be handled, in addition to the ‘traditional’ yellow flag (see above), without having to resort to the dreaded ‘race stoppage’.
First, of course, there’s the Safety Car. But the procedure for using the Safety Car is different, depending whether we’re at Le Mans or not. And either case that’s different from procedures in the US, where many of the WEC drivers are occupied on non-clashing races.
Second, there’s the Full Course Yellow – similar to the so-called ‘Virtual Safety Car’ procedure in F1, but entirely different from a Safety Car procedure, in that drivers are required to keep to a blanket speed limit, imposed at the same time on the whole circuit. Theoretically at least, this should lead to ‘no bunching’, but Lewis Hamilton jeopardised even that theory by his antics at the US GP.
And third, there is the Slow Zone – again, requiring drivers to keep to a speed limit (80km/h), but only for a specific, and hopefully short, section of the track.
I hope you, dear reader, are keeping up here. Because if you’re not, then what chance the 100-odd racing drivers that take part in every round of the WEC?
At Shanghai, there were four periods of Full Course Caution, and at Fuji there were three. In three of those seven periods, pit stops were made by one or more of the Porsches and Audis that were at the sharp end of those races. Quite obviously, there is a lot to be gained from pitting during a FCY period, and if teams did not realise this initially, it is now common knowledge. Only two of these periods lasted for more than ten minutes, the rest were five minutes or less. In terms of laps, only one period was for more than three laps.
If the Safety Car is used, then the pit lane is closed for the first three laps. This rule is in place, not for safety reasons, but to avoid that some cars gain an advantage. There doesn’t seem any logical reason to me why the SC should close the pit lane, but that a FCY period should not – the advantage to be gained is identical. In fact, at Shanghai and Fuji, the SC laps were quicker than those spent under FCY conditions, so the chances of a car running out of fuel was actually greater – except for the fact, of course, that the SC was only used at the start of both races.
In the tennis match of rule-making, the ball is now in the FIA WEC Endurance Committee’s court to close this loophole and close the pit lane during a FCY period.
Although the option of a Slow Zone has been available to race director Eduardo Freitas, it has not been used since Le Mans. Bearing in mind the carnage that ensued as SZ procedures were not properly implemented - on more than one occasion - at Le Mans, one can see the wisdom of this. But, it is only by implementing these things, and learning from the experiences, that we will get to a satisfactory position.
It is interesting, that in drivers’ briefings, they are told that, in the implementation of a FCY, there is a “reaction time” element: enabling drivers (in effect) to choose the moment when they reduce speed to 80km/h. This is entirely sensible, since you don’t want to be hitting the brakes halfway through a long, high-speed corner. The main problem with the existing SZ procedure is the transition into and out of it. Preceding any Slow Zone is a yellow flag zone, through which drivers have to slow from racing speed to 80km/h. After the Slow Zone, the green flag indicates an immediate return to racing speed is possible. It is in the transition zones where the problems arise, particularly due to less-experienced drivers in some of the less powerful cars.
It seems to me that race officials need to recognise this and make suitable allowance in the procedure, to make the Slow Zone a more effective tool. At the moment it is under-utilised and wasted, in my opinion.
Familiarity with the procedure, whatever it is, undoubtedly helps, as does a clear message in driver briefings. These days, telemetry and GPS data are available to Race Control, so identifying transgressions and dangerous driving should not be as subjective an issue as in former times. If penalties for dangerous driving were draconian but fair, and safety rules and procedures were consistent, not just during a season, but across different series and championships, regardless of territory, organising body or racing discipline, then drivers would respond, and perhaps could then trusted to behave appropriately when following safety regulations.
It will never be possible to completely remove the element of chance and luck from racing. But to ensure that safety procedures commensurate with the times in which we currently live are feasible, drivers, race officials – in the control tower and on the circuit – as well as the spectators, need to know and understand what is going on. Then, and only then, will it be possible to create maximum safety with minimum disruption.
Wednesday, 14 October 2015
Reading the signs, drawing conclusions and personal opinions
From early in the week leading up to the Six Hours of Fuji, my weather widget was suggesting that some fairly heavy rain would arrive on Sunday, although it would be dry and sunny before that. This meant that although Practice and Qualifying would most likely take place in ideal conditions, the race itself would be affected by rain. For once, my forecast was reasonably accurate, and the rain was so bad on Sunday morning that the race was started behind the Safety Car. For 17 laps (38m 19s) the Safety Car led the field around and if it wasn’t entirely the same as 2013, there were certainly echoes of that event, which had to be aborted after just sixteen (non-racing) laps.
The world has moved on since I first started going to endurance races, but in days gone by, conditions that greeted competitors on Sunday morning would probably have meant race officials delaying the start, pending a decision based on whether things seemed to be improving or not. When they decided that the race could proceed, then it things would get under way, and the race would run for its full distance. If there was live TV coverage – and most likely there was not – then they would just have to deal with it, much as commentators at Fuji had to deal with talking about cars following the Safety Car for more than half-an-hour. That’s just what commentators do.
I sometimes wonder why TV companies can deal with cricket, which can often be delayed for hours due to inclement weather; or tennis, where the duration of the event is completely unpredictable, and yet demand that motor races should start and end at a specific time, “for the sake of the show”. I recognise that TV coverage is important to the sport, but occasionally I think that we get the horse and the cart the wrong way round with motor racing. Television is there to observe the event, not to direct it.
Be all of that as it may, the rules are clearly written these days to deal with such situations that we had in Japan, and we were treated, not to inane pictures of marshals pretending that they were fishing in a brook, but to the action of racing sports cars being waved off the echelon formation, to join the ‘race’ behind the Safety Car, which moved off the grid punctually at 11am, the scheduled start time.
Time spent behind the Safety Car is part of the race, of course, so as soon as the race got underway, team tacticians up and down the pit lane started to work out how they could use the time to their advantage. It was an opportunity to try to second-guess the officials – how long would the Safety Car stay out? Would the track be dry enough for “wet” as opposed to “monsoon” tyres when it went green? Was it worth putting the “silver” driver in the car?
Even though those first seventeen laps weren’t racing, they were part of the race, and provided plenty to keep spectators at the track and viewers of the TV and Internet streaming pictures entertained. It was nothing, though, compared to the action that started as soon as the green flag waved. The beauty of the World Endurance Championship is that it is racing that works on a number of levels – on the strategic, tactical level working out when to pit, how to make the fuel last, etc. but also on a pure racinglevel; providing great action on the track: nose to tail, side by side stuff, and more overtaking than you can shake a stick at.
In a race of fluctuating fortunes throughout the field, Porsche once again emerged at the front of the race for the overall lead, the 919 Hybrid proving once again to be too fast when it mattered. Audi’s aerodynamically-updated R18 e-tron quattro was clearly an improvement, not only setting the fastest lap of the race, but also keeping the Porsches out of the lead for 50 laps: nearly a quarter of the race.
The Dumas/Lieb/Jani Porsche was able to establish a lead of nearly a minute, thanks to fortuitous timing of a Full Course Yellow, just as the car was coming into the pits to refuel. It (briefly) re-ignited the debate into how to ensure that race neutralisations should be implemented without disrupting the pattern of the race, but I think that will have to be covered in another post at another time.
The race really turned Porsche’s way when Audi made a bad decision to put André Lotterer onto dry-weather slick tyres halfway through his stint, though. It is interesting to speculate on what might have happened had he been left on the ‘slick intermediates’.
Let’s have a look at the numbers:
In the same time period that Lotterer was doing his seven laps on slicks, the two Porsches were averaging 1m 35s, so it is fair to assume that Lotterer, had he not have switched, would have been lapping eight seconds per lap faster for those seven laps. Additionally, had André kept the ‘slick intermediate’ tyres on (as Hartley, Lieb and di Grassi all did), then he would have saved not only the second stop to switch back to the inters (58.441s), but also the twenty-two seconds that it took to change to full slicks at his first pit stop.
Add all this together and you get (56+58+22=136) 2m 16s. Go back and look at the official results, and you’ll find that the winning Porsche finished the race 2m 16.479s ahead of the Audi (although it was a lap ahead, you can still calculate the winning margin).
Now of course we must remember that the Lieb/Dumas/Jani Porsche (that finished second) was served a drive-through penalty for not respecting the yellow flags, and then was slowed artificially to allow its team-mates, which had suffered torque problems throughout the race, to pass for the sake of championship points. So to put the case that Audi could have won the race is probably wrong. However, on a track where Audi has never won, surely there must be some cause for optimism in Ingolstadt and at Joest Racing in the remaining two rounds of the championship at Shanghai and Bahrain? Even though the odds may be slim, Audi is not going to give up the silverware without a fight.
The world has moved on since I first started going to endurance races, but in days gone by, conditions that greeted competitors on Sunday morning would probably have meant race officials delaying the start, pending a decision based on whether things seemed to be improving or not. When they decided that the race could proceed, then it things would get under way, and the race would run for its full distance. If there was live TV coverage – and most likely there was not – then they would just have to deal with it, much as commentators at Fuji had to deal with talking about cars following the Safety Car for more than half-an-hour. That’s just what commentators do.
I sometimes wonder why TV companies can deal with cricket, which can often be delayed for hours due to inclement weather; or tennis, where the duration of the event is completely unpredictable, and yet demand that motor races should start and end at a specific time, “for the sake of the show”. I recognise that TV coverage is important to the sport, but occasionally I think that we get the horse and the cart the wrong way round with motor racing. Television is there to observe the event, not to direct it.
Be all of that as it may, the rules are clearly written these days to deal with such situations that we had in Japan, and we were treated, not to inane pictures of marshals pretending that they were fishing in a brook, but to the action of racing sports cars being waved off the echelon formation, to join the ‘race’ behind the Safety Car, which moved off the grid punctually at 11am, the scheduled start time.
Time spent behind the Safety Car is part of the race, of course, so as soon as the race got underway, team tacticians up and down the pit lane started to work out how they could use the time to their advantage. It was an opportunity to try to second-guess the officials – how long would the Safety Car stay out? Would the track be dry enough for “wet” as opposed to “monsoon” tyres when it went green? Was it worth putting the “silver” driver in the car?
Even though those first seventeen laps weren’t racing, they were part of the race, and provided plenty to keep spectators at the track and viewers of the TV and Internet streaming pictures entertained. It was nothing, though, compared to the action that started as soon as the green flag waved. The beauty of the World Endurance Championship is that it is racing that works on a number of levels – on the strategic, tactical level working out when to pit, how to make the fuel last, etc. but also on a pure racinglevel; providing great action on the track: nose to tail, side by side stuff, and more overtaking than you can shake a stick at.
In a race of fluctuating fortunes throughout the field, Porsche once again emerged at the front of the race for the overall lead, the 919 Hybrid proving once again to be too fast when it mattered. Audi’s aerodynamically-updated R18 e-tron quattro was clearly an improvement, not only setting the fastest lap of the race, but also keeping the Porsches out of the lead for 50 laps: nearly a quarter of the race.
The Dumas/Lieb/Jani Porsche was able to establish a lead of nearly a minute, thanks to fortuitous timing of a Full Course Yellow, just as the car was coming into the pits to refuel. It (briefly) re-ignited the debate into how to ensure that race neutralisations should be implemented without disrupting the pattern of the race, but I think that will have to be covered in another post at another time.
The race really turned Porsche’s way when Audi made a bad decision to put André Lotterer onto dry-weather slick tyres halfway through his stint, though. It is interesting to speculate on what might have happened had he been left on the ‘slick intermediates’.
Let’s have a look at the numbers:
| No. | Car | Driver | Stint Start | Stint End | Laps | Average green lap time |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 17 | Porsche | Hartley | 13:23 | 14:31 | 40 | 1m 36.586s |
| 17 | Porsche | Hartley | 14:32 | 15:33 | 39 | 1m 31.261s |
| 18 | Porsche | Lieb | 13:25 | 14:31 | 40 | 1m 36.508s |
| 18 | Porsche | Lieb | 14:32 | 15:31 | 37 | 1m 31.520s |
| 7 | Audi | Lotterer | 13:15 | 14:20 | 38 | 1m 37.219s |
| 7 | Audi | Lotterer | 14:21 | 14:33 | 7 | 1m 43.348s |
| 7 | Audi | Lotterer | 14:34 | 15:31 | 36 | 1m 32.092s |
| 8 | Audi | di Grassi | 13:18 | 14:19 | 36 | 1m 37.808s |
| 8 | Audi | di Grassi | 14:20 | 15:15 | 34 | 1m 34.087s |
In the same time period that Lotterer was doing his seven laps on slicks, the two Porsches were averaging 1m 35s, so it is fair to assume that Lotterer, had he not have switched, would have been lapping eight seconds per lap faster for those seven laps. Additionally, had André kept the ‘slick intermediate’ tyres on (as Hartley, Lieb and di Grassi all did), then he would have saved not only the second stop to switch back to the inters (58.441s), but also the twenty-two seconds that it took to change to full slicks at his first pit stop.
Add all this together and you get (56+58+22=136) 2m 16s. Go back and look at the official results, and you’ll find that the winning Porsche finished the race 2m 16.479s ahead of the Audi (although it was a lap ahead, you can still calculate the winning margin).
Now of course we must remember that the Lieb/Dumas/Jani Porsche (that finished second) was served a drive-through penalty for not respecting the yellow flags, and then was slowed artificially to allow its team-mates, which had suffered torque problems throughout the race, to pass for the sake of championship points. So to put the case that Audi could have won the race is probably wrong. However, on a track where Audi has never won, surely there must be some cause for optimism in Ingolstadt and at Joest Racing in the remaining two rounds of the championship at Shanghai and Bahrain? Even though the odds may be slim, Audi is not going to give up the silverware without a fight.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
