2018 F1 Season

[Preds Partisan]

Something to watch for, especially with Renault and Ferrari.

 

[Preds Partisan]

For US viewers, ESPN finally released their broadcast schedule:

 

[Zorf]

What website do you guys use for F1 news?

I used to read gpupdate.net, but it turned into autosport.com, and it sucks.

I also check the official formula 1 page. Just curious if there are any hidden gems.

 

[CHRDANHUTCH]

What website do you guys use for F1 news?

I used to read gpupdate.net, but it turned into autosport.com, and it sucks.

I also check the official formula 1 page. Just curious if there are any hidden gems.

BEST sites I use are F1-UPDATE, and Formula 1 Unlimited (Facebook)

 

[Preds Partisan]

I don't really have a favorite website....Google has so much data on me it pretty much pushes everything I need. Unfortunately over the last several years a bunch of sites are subscription/premium now and I've noticed that there's a lot of copy/paste going on so it's the same article repeated on multiple sites.

I find the more interesting info through Twitter to be honest. For example, during testing the best timing run to run and photos/videos were only found via Twitter.

 

[Kane One]

I just mostly go on /r/formula1 and Motorsport.com.

 

[Preds Partisan]

From Pirelli's preseason testing, here are the performance gaps between compounds for 2018:

Hypersoft .7 - .8 seconds faster than Ultrasoft

Ultrasoft .6 faster than Supersoft

Supersoft .4 faster than Soft

Soft .8 faster than Medium

Insufficient data with the Hard due to lack of testing miles, plus the Hard is just a backup compound for 2018.

Note: All compounds are about one step softer than 2017 and the 2018 Medium is the same as the 2017 Soft.

Pirelli is selecting tires to ensure two stop races and using more data points as the season proceeds to make races "more interesting" with those tire selections.

 

[Siamese Dream]

I don't see why they need to bother with all the different names for the compounds, it's just confusing for casual/new fans and only the geeks really care. Just call the ones you take to each race the soft/medium/hard for that particular race, like back in the 2-compound days when they were mostly just referred to as prime/option and no real mention of how hard it was.

 

[Preds Partisan]

Because F1 does stupid things.

 

[Preds Partisan]

There are various news outlets reporting that there will be additional F1 content (not racing, but interviews, reports, highlights etc.) to augment your in-country race coverage on FB, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram this season. I guess it's supposed to fill the gaps in coverage and be more like every other sport on the planet. It's part of F1's attempt to get more content out there globally, I guess.

 

[Preds Partisan]

Ricciardo got a 3 spot grid penalty plus two points on his Super Licence for violation of red flag speed during FP2. He never seems to catch a break at his home race.

 

[SoupyFIN]

Ricciardo got a 3 spot grid penalty plus two points on his Super Licence for violation of red flag speed during FP2. He never seems to catch a break at his home race.

That is a really dumb penalty to take though. The delta time you can't go over is on the steering wheel's screen (not sure if it's just the time, or if it shows whether you're under or over it), how does he miss that in FP2 of all sessions?

I think this is the first time it has happened in practice or quali since the VSC/SC delta time was put in place.

 

[Preds Partisan]

He admitted he misread his screen, plus they have all the telemetry, video, etc. It's enforcement of some new rule clarification for 2018 about red flags and from what I read they gave him a reduced penalty since he didn't cause a dangerous situation.

Dumb mistake on a most likely overly complex rule with a fairly heavy penalty (especially since he's part of the top 3 teams) where F1 is trying to send an early message to the field. That's my takeaway.

 

[Shrimper]

The camera angle with the Halo view is completely useless.

 

[Preds Partisan]

That Bottas hit was 27g resulting in gearbox change so he starts 15th. I think that was the only crash all weekend.

Qualifying shook out pretty much like winter testing and practice has gone. The top three are clearly way above. Haas has legit early season speed, along with Renault and McLaren making up the front of the pack. Force India brought a new car from testing, but who knows if its race pace is that much better than they are showing. Williams, STR and Sauber at this point separating themselves on the bottom.

I think it's supposed to rain overnight so green track for the race.

 

[CHRDANHUTCH]

Initial reactions to Sky Sports UK FEED ON ESPN/ESPN2

 

[SoupyFIN]

That Bottas hit was 27g resulting in gearbox change so he starts 15th. I think that was the only crash all weekend.

I'd imagine Mercedes is going to use this opportunity to take an engine penalty as well, makes no difference really if he starts 15th or 20th.

 

[Preds Partisan]

Initial reactions to Sky Sports UK FEED ON ESPN/ESPN2

The best part is no commercials and that ESPN must not have realized that there is no score crawl beneath the picture...it's just straight Sky video feed. I suspect that will change. Also, ESPN just announced that they are adding Sky's pre-race show, don't know about post race analysis, podium interview, etc.---find out tomorrow I guess.

I've already heard the commentators over the years so that was a known quantity for me. The video is world feed so I guess that's pretty much the same and I don't know if the graphics are new for 2018 or Sky, but they'll do. As an American I like the British dry humor...NBC was 3/4 British so I'm used to that particular rythm of the broadcast.

I watched all three practices and qualifying and it seems Sky is McLaren and Williams heavy among the seven teams that make up the pack. They had Horner on from the pitwall, but did they interview anyone else? Missed hearing from any other teams or driver. I'm used to periodic interviews on NBC.

They never acknowledged the US viewers once that I heard. Maybe it's petty, but why not recognize the broadcasting partnership with ESPN?

The biggest negative is that they had almost no technical explanations or interesting tidbits about the different teams. Nobody wants to get a graduate level engineering lecture, but they didn't give anything to the viewers. Everytime I watched NBC I learned something. Their broadcast made me a smarter and better F1 fan. Sky hasn't done that yet.

Remembering where we came from upon the ESPN announcement, literally no information on the broadcast, I think it will be ok. We now get the Sky coverage of all practices, qualifying, pre-race and race. Its on either TV or streaming and replays on ESPN3 for everything if you miss it. Originally we thought it was just going to be some ESPN hack fumbling around just for the races. So, the US viewers are getting a decent amount of coverage. I'm way more optimistic than I was, but ESPN sucks generally.

 

[Preds Partisan]

I'd imagine Mercedes is going to use this opportunity to take an engine penalty as well, makes no difference really if he starts 15th or 20th.

That would only leave Bottas with two for the rest of the year because of the new three engine limit for 2018.

 

[SoupyFIN]

That would only leave Bottas with two for the rest of the year because of the new three engine limit for 2018.

4th engine I mean.

Unless they changed the rules so that you can't take that penalty until you've used all three?

 

[Preds Partisan]

4th engine I mean.

Unless they changed the rules so that you can't take that penalty until you've used all three?

Yeah, there wouldn't be a penalty until after the three, but I meant Merc wouldn't want to lose an engine on race 1 with only like 3 hours on it.

 

[SoupyFIN]

Yeah, there wouldn't be a penalty until after the three, but I meant Merc wouldn't want to lose an engine on race 1 with only like 3 hours on it.

Well that sucks then. So you have to stick with that one engine, through all the sessions? And you can't go back to it after changing?

 

[Preds Partisan]

Well that sucks then. So you have to stick with that one engine, through all the sessions? And you can't go back to it after changing?

I see what you're saying, why not switch it out and then reuse later without penalty? Yeah that's still allowed.

I was saying that since they only get three, and we know that Merc has at least one upgrade coming this year, they wouldn't want to leave Bottas with only two options. If they used a second engine this weekend, that would be engine #1 and #2 with the current spec. and would only leave engine #3 to be used for that future upgrade. That's what I meant about "wasting" an engine. Sorry for the confusion.

Also, here's the 2018 PU breakdown: three ICE, TC and MGU-H and just two MGU-K, CE and ES. It was four of each.

It's still six consecutive races per gearbox.

 

[SoupyFIN]

I see what you're saying, why not switch it out and then reuse later without penalty? Yeah that's still allowed.

I was saying that since they only get three, and we know that Merc has at least one upgrade coming this year, they wouldn't want to leave Bottas with only two options. If they used a second engine this weekend, that would be engine #1 and #2 with the current spec. and would only leave engine #3 to be used for that future upgrade. That's what I meant about "wasting" an engine. Sorry for the confusion.

Also, here's the 2018 PU breakdown: three ICE, TC and MGU-H and just two MGU-K, CE and ES. It was four of each.

It's still six consecutive races per gearbox.

Last year it was four engines/components and they could switch between those four units at any time (IIRC before quali when the parc ferme rules begin), the gearbox couldn't be touched and had to stay the same for 6 races. However, they could also take that 5th unit at any time (or 6th/7th/8th etc. in McLaren's case) and thus trigger the penalty for using an extra unit.

So if Mercedes changed the engine now, it would be engine #2, not #4 and they'd still get the penalty?

 

[Preds Partisan]

Like you said, only McLaren is an expert in grid penalties. They could probably answer the question. There's more going on than we understand.