An idea to improve overtaking

First, we need the old point-system back, where only the first 6 get points, cause the current one is bad. A system like before 1991 would be nice. 9-6-4-3-2-1

Also, a nice idea would be to bring back the system, where the badest finished-race-position gonna be dropped from your points.

Then we need more classical tracks like Estoril, Jerez or Buenos Aires. Tracks in countries, where the interest of the national people is weak, are not worth to have in a worldwide broadcasted race league.

Last but not least, the cars should be reworked.
- Expanded tyre-suspensions (2 metres)
- Front wing not so expanded, a bit narrower as the current ones.
- The small winglets on frontwings should be banned.
- The rear wings would be better, when they are not so high and expand back like we had before (2008). - The current sidepod form should be banned. The sidepods should be like in the past squared and without any extra winglets.
- And please, bring back sidepods.

Vandusk Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> First, we need the old point-system back, where
> only the first 6 get points, cause the current one
> is bad. A system like before 1991 would be nice.
> 9-6-4-3-2-1
>
> Also, a nice idea would be to bring back the
> system, where the badest finished-race-position
> gonna be dropped from your points.
>
> Then we need more classical tracks like Estoril,
> Jerez or Buenos Aires. Tracks in countries, where
> the interest of the national people is weak, are
> not worth to have in a worldwide broadcasted race
> league.
>
> Last but not least, the cars should be reworked.
> - Expanded tyre-suspensions (2 metres)
> - Front wing not so expanded, a bit narrower as
> the current ones.
> - The small winglets on frontwings should be
> banned.
> - The rear wings would be better, when they are
> not so high and expand back like we had before
> (2008). - The current sidepod form should be
> banned. The sidepods should be like in the past
> squared and without any extra winglets.
> - And please, bring back sidepods.


I don't really see how most of this will make any difference to overtaking. Changes to points, for example, will make little difference - the drivers always WANT to get the best result, and they will try to overtake if the cars and tracks allow it.

The changes to the front/rear wings were intended to allow closer running, and they worked (although somewhat scuppered by the diffuser loophole), so why go back to the 2008 configuration?

There are many arguments to going back to classic tracks in countries where there are lots of fans. But the number of spectators isn't going to improve overtaking either!

If you list suggestions, at least give some justification of why you've listed them. :/

---

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Please find us on [en.wikipedia.org] for more information.

Vandusk schreef:
-------------------------------------------------------
> First, we need the old point-system back, where
> only the first 6 get points, cause the current one
> is bad. A system like before 1991 would be nice.
> 9-6-4-3-2-1
>
> Also, a nice idea would be to bring back the
> system, where the badest finished-race-position
> gonna be dropped from your points.
>
> Then we need more classical tracks like Estoril,
> Jerez or Buenos Aires. Tracks in countries, where
> the interest of the national people is weak, are
> not worth to have in a worldwide broadcasted race
> league.
>
> Last but not least, the cars should be reworked.
> - Expanded tyre-suspensions (2 metres)
> - Front wing not so expanded, a bit narrower as
> the current ones.
> - The small winglets on frontwings should be
> banned.
> - The rear wings would be better, when they are
> not so high and expand back like we had before
> (2008). - The current sidepod form should be
> banned. The sidepods should be like in the past
> squared and without any extra winglets.
> - And please, bring back sidepods.


Ah, the populist 'it all used to be better in the old days'-view. Looks nice in theory, but almost never works out in practise.

> First, we need the old point-system back, where
> only the first 6 get points, cause the current one
> is bad. A system like before 1991 would be nice.
> 9-6-4-3-2-1

Bad plan. You are basicaly inviting the top 3 teams to lock out the points every week, and make sure that lower teams never ever have a shot at points. A good argument for changing it was that standards are higher now than every before, so lower teams could never have a shot at anything.

> Also, a nice idea would be to bring back the
> system, where the badest finished-race-position
> gonna be dropped from your points.

Why? To make it more confusing?

> Then we need more classical tracks like Estoril,
> Jerez or Buenos Aires. Tracks in countries, where
> the interest of the national people is weak, are
> not worth to have in a worldwide broadcasted race
> league.

All 3 of those circuits suck.

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DaveEllis schrieb:
-------------------------------------------------------
> > Then we need more classical tracks like
> Estoril,
> > Jerez or Buenos Aires. Tracks in countries,
> where
> > the interest of the national people is weak,
> are
> > not worth to have in a worldwide broadcasted
> race
> > league.
>
> All 3 of those circuits suck.

and which circuits do you want see? More Tilke-Droms or what?

Agreed with Dave on the points thing. With the levels of reliability these days, you need more points-paying positions rather than less. The old points system was appropriate for its day, but times have changed.
And the "Best 11 scores count" system was needlessly confusing as well as unfair on the drivers who consistently scored points, which was why it only lasted for a few seasons.

---

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/11/2009 11:53PM by EC83.

Buenos Aires doesent sucks, the layout used from 95 to 98 suck. The BsAs circuit has 15 configurations, they have to use the 74 layout, Circuit No. 15. FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAST

One way of more overtaking in the current format will be to play with the engine.

The engine should be 2.4l turbo charged that would produce an excess of 2500 bhp. Without traction control (may have to remove the torque controller that has come in since British GP 2008) this will be monster to drive, will introduce the component called driver error once again and we will have overtaking.

Monza straight will have have a top speed of over 270 mph, Eau Rouge will not be flat out if the driver wants to live and drivers will be scared of an F1 car once again as if they don't respect it they are going to end up in a box.

Sorry, but I don't see how a heightened chance of death is in any way an "improvement" to F1. :s

---

K*bots UK, specialist providers of 'fun science' Curriculum Enhancement days for Primary and Secondary schools in Britain.
Please find us on [en.wikipedia.org] for more information.

I can see the reasoning for more power, and hence less corners that can be taken flat-out. But I don't think compromising safety is the way to go.


How about:

The driver with the most overtaking moves at the end of the season gets to punch Bernie in the face.

hans Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> One way of more overtaking in the current format
> will be to play with the engine.
>
> The engine should be 2.4l turbo charged that would
> produce an excess of 2500 bhp. Without traction
> control (may have to remove the torque controller
> that has come in since British GP 2008) this will
> be monster to drive, will introduce the component
> called driver error once again and we will have
> overtaking.
>
> Monza straight will have have a top speed of over
> 270 mph, Eau Rouge will not be flat out if the
> driver wants to live and drivers will be scared of
> an F1 car once again as if they don't respect it
> they are going to end up in a box.

I can't even begin to explain what is wrong with that.

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hans Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Monza straight will have have a top speed of over
> 270 mph, Eau Rouge will not be flat out if the
> driver wants to live and drivers will be scared of
> an F1 car once again as if they don't respect it
> they are going to end up in a box.

Are you for real?

---

I think the main change that would allow drivers to pass or at least have a go it's the increase of the brake distance. It's not easy to overtake when there are less than 100m from the brake point to the curve.

And i guess the best way to increase this distance is changing the brakes to other material not as good as the one they have now. Maybe steel or something like that.

Another thing is that FIA is reducing the power of the engines, so if some time ago at Monza they reached speeds > 360 km/h, nowadays F1 cars only get to 340, thus decreasing the brake distance a bit more.

The Superleague Formula cars are passing each other every lap at Jarama which isn't the best overtaking circuit and F1's can't pass in Abu Dhabi which is perfect. It's definetely not the circuits.

The FIA held an international seminar yesterday on overtaking

[www.grandprix.com]

Its good that Hermann Tilke was involved, but hopefully the solution wasn't just to manufacture tracks for overtaking. Tracks like Abu Dhabi, which have been designed under stringent restrictions in terms of hairpins and long straights, didn't provide overtaking, so we may as well at least build some tracks with variety, especially high speed ones, and then work on the cars a bit more.

---

X (@ed24f1)

super__alonso Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The Superleague Formula cars are passing each
> other every lap at Jarama which isn't the best
> overtaking circuit and F1's can't pass in Abu
> Dhabi which is perfect. It's definetely not the
> circuits.


SLF is full of rejected F1 drivers, with a massive variation in driving standards. Lower series always have more passing because the standards are lower.

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Maybe I'm wrong, but the fundamental cause of lack of overtaking in F1 is, in my opinion, the front wing design.

The main problem is the difference in front end aero grip between clean air versus dirty air, particularly predominent in mid/high speed corners.

The source of dirty air is the rear of the car. The source of loss of grip is the front of the car, where the airflow is most disturbed. For the life of me, I cannot understand why the front wings were enlarged for 2009! It shifted the aero dynamic dependance of the car forward, thereby increased the effect of dirty air on downforce levels.

If the front wing were to have remained at 2008 dimensions, or perhaps shrunk by 20%, cars would be more aerodynamically stable at high speed and hence, be able to follow closer through high speed corners. Net effect should be more overtaking.

The other main culprit is the engine rev limit. Completely mind-numbingly pointless.... 18k is too low, and negated the effects of the slipstream. Sure, teams could edit the gear ratios to take advantage of a slipstream, but the net effect is only small at most tracks (mostly due to the fact that its so hard to follow another car into the straight, see above...). I don't think it's any conincidence that the problem of overtaking has been exasperated as the rev limit was imposed and then tightened. If there has to be a revlimit, then it should be 20K. And the engine development freeze lifted during the offseason.

Finally, the points system is partly to blame. When everything was to race for, like in Brazil, there were some pretty stunning battles. It might upset a few people, but a points system which exponentially decreases to last place might inspire better racing than the the system in place now. Start at 100pts, and work your way back to 1pt.

No doubt many will disagree, but I think that those 3 relatively straightforward changes would boost the spectacle for all.

All good and well, but your 3rd point completely contradicts your first 2. :P

Well true, but the interlagos circuit is perhaps the closest to perfect for overtaking in an F1 car. No high speed 'Maggots' style corners, or Istanbul turn 8's... plenty of elevation change.

Lets be honest, at tracks like Valencia a change in the points system isn't going to make a whole lot of difference. A few fundamental tweaks to the regs would make that difference. The points change argument was a bit contradictory though, I guess :p