2016 season F1 Testing

[Mike Harte]

Well, it's just a few days until the new season starts off, with the first of the two 4 days tests at Barcelona. We now know who all the runners and riders are, but who would seriously want to take a bet that Mercedes won't be up there at or near the top; no doubt one team or another will run on fumes or underweight or some other sleight of engineering hand to grab bragging rights (or at least give their sponsors some quality time in the limelight).

One thing that disturbs me is that Force India are running Celis on two out of the first four days; why on earth are they doing that? The race drivers have just 4 days to settle into the new cars and try to finess the settings as best that they can before the red light goes out for practice in Melbourne. Has Force India been reduced to the level that they cannot operate without the finance from Celis or his backers. And his results in the last few years don't exactly inspire; 12th and 16th in GP3 and RF3.5 respectively.

Anyway, let the show begin.

[chillibowl]

i would suspect money is the reason.

its been building for a few years now, and to their credit the team has produced some quality results and remained solvent but i feel like this year is going to be their last year under the FI guise.

i feel a 'whats wrong with FI' thread coming on. lol

as for testing, have any of the other driver line ups been announced?

[Mike Harte]

Latest:

MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY
Mercedes Hamilton Rosberg Hamilton Rosberg
Ferrari Vettel Vettel Raikkonen Raikkonen
Williams Bottas Bottas Massa Massa
Red Bull Ricciardo Ricciardo Kvyat Kvyat
Force India Celis Perez Hulkenberg Celis
Renault Palmer Palmer Magnussen Magnussen
Toro Rosso Sainz Verstappen Sainz Verstappen
Sauber Ericsson Ericsson Nasr Nasr
McLaren Button Alonso Button Alonso
Manor Wehrlein Wehrlein Haryanto Haryanto
HaasGrosjean Gutierrez Grosjean Gutierrez

Sorry about the formatting; the website seems to have it's own ideas how the above table should look, no matter how much I try to edit it.

[chillibowl]

thanks for that.

interesting mix/split among the teams opting for either drivers alternating days or drivers doing two days in a row.

[Neppatsrev Xam]

Originally Posted by Mike Harte

Latest:

MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY
Mercedes Hamilton Rosberg Hamilton Rosberg
Ferrari Vettel Vettel Raikkonen Raikkonen
Williams Bottas Bottas Massa Massa
Red Bull Ricciardo Ricciardo Kvyat Kvyat
Force India Celis Perez Hulkenberg Celis
Renault Palmer Palmer Magnussen Magnussen
Toro Rosso Sainz Verstappen Sainz Verstappen
Sauber Ericsson Ericsson Nasr Nasr
McLaren Button Alonso Button Alonso
Manor Wehrlein Wehrlein Haryanto Haryanto
HaasGrosjean Gutierrez Grosjean Gutierrez

Sorry about the formatting; the website seems to have it's own ideas how the above table should look, no matter how much I try to edit it.

Force India must be really desperate for money if they give 2 of their 4 days to Celis

[wolfhound]

Originally Posted by Neppatsrev Xam

Force India must be really desperate for money if they give 2 of their 4 days to Celis

1st day is basically systems checks and establishing base lines so I doubt Celis will make much difference unless........... he bins it. That assumes there is not a lot of first day issues and they complete about 3 laps.
Last day if he bins it (trying to match Hulk & Perez) at least the regular drivers will have had some chance to see what the potential of the car really is.

[JoestEver]

Honestly, it's already a positive sign that Force India can at least get its new car in the first outing. Much better than last year.

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by wolfhound

1st day is basically systems checks and establishing base lines so I doubt Celis will make much difference unless........... he bins it. That assumes there is not a lot of first day issues and they complete about 3 laps.
Last day if he bins it (trying to match Hulk & Perez) at least the regular drivers will have had some chance to see what the potential of the car really is.

This , IMHO, is really not the way to think. Looking at how the majority of the teams completed their 1st week's testing last year, most of them managed to complete quite a few laps, 50 or more in some case. And in some ways, the first few days are the most important because they can become the foundation of how the car will develop during the year, and the way the car is initioally set up. If you don't have the race drivers doing this important work, and somebody who has absolutely no real experience of F1, you acn very easily end up going down the completely wrong path.

[djinvicta]

Sat in a hotel tonight opposite Barcelona track. Transporters turning up..

[JeremySmith]

Originally Posted by djinvicta

Sat in a hotel tonight opposite Barcelona track. Transporters turning up..

How cool is that please shoot some video !

[old man]

There are alternative series for people to consider:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGE1WUXS-UY&sns=em

[Born Racer]

And it's go, go, go!

Really looking forward to seeing how testing develops. It's an intriguing time of potential promises and disappointments and questionable performances (for good or bad - is Team X really that quick/ slow?). These days with in-season testing virtually zero, we know that big developments in-season don't seem to be happening so the performances are perhaps more representative of what is to come than in the past.

Originally Posted by Mike Harte

And in some ways, the first few days are the most important because they can become the foundation of how the car will develop during the year, and the way the car is initioally set up. If you don't have the race drivers doing this important work, and somebody who has absolutely no real experience of F1, you can very easily end up going down the completely wrong path.

Yes, I've found myself thinking inexperienced drivers are not what the teams need in the car to diagnose any problems and provide the best baseline. Could it be that these days simulators are helping inexperienced drivers get up to that baseline quicker than in the past, thereby allowing them to be consistently on the pace or at a decent enough pace to provide this type of testing? Or could it be that simulators are negating slightly the need to have experienced drivers in the real car because teams can 'interpret' the feedback they have from these inexperienced drivers better?

[Born Racer]

That's a curious-looking bit of sculpting on the left side of the McLaren nose. Why might it be raised in that bubble form?

[chrisrb2002]

Originally Posted by Born Racer

That's a curious-looking bit of sculpting on the left side of the McLaren nose. Why might it be raised in that bubble form?

Its a sensor.

[Moneyseeker]

Have to say some of the front wings getting more and more complicated. The McLaren one looks amazing or ridiculous depnding on which way your view on aero is!

[BertMk2]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Have to say some of the front wings getting more and more complicated. The McLaren one looks amazing or ridiculous depnding on which way your view on aero is!

At least the McLaren front wing stayed attached to the car - did the Haas wing fall off after contact with something or was it just a simple structural failure? (which would be more worrying for them).

[Richard C]

I have heard no mention of contact on the Haas prior to loosing the front wing. Which is worrisome. I hope they don't have a rash of front wing failures during testing as it will really set them back with respect to getting to understand the car. In a way, I would assume you would show up with wings that you feel might be on the heavy/overly strong side and then later in the season start to explore solutions (during practice) that might be on the edge. Haas seem to be getting in some laps which is good.

McLaren already looking much better (number of laps) than this time last year, but I am not surprised given where they left off at end of last season.

Richard

[Moneyseeker]

Originally Posted by BertMk2

At least the McLaren front wing stayed attached to the car - did the Haas wing fall off after contact with something or was it just a simple structural failure? (which would be more worrying for them).

Came off on the pit straight and was a wing failure.

[BertMk2]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Came off on the pit straight and was a wing failure.

That's not ideal then - but they have continued running so presumably they're not overly concerned (or are using a different spec wing now - may have a couple of different ones on site?).

Mercedes have been pretty relentless all day, pounding round racking up the mileage, they seem to be living up to their 'favourites' tag although the Ferrari is looking good too. Red Bull and Williams look fairly closely matched, McLaren should at least be pleased they've completed a race distance on day 1 (although not in one go). Renault bottom of the pile - keeping their powder dry or a genuine lack of pace? Have they essentially just got last years car and bolted the Renault engine to it?


Note: All of the above should be taken with the caveat that it's only testing and we don't know what fuel loads people are running (although the Mercedes must have been carrying a fair amount to do those longer stints).

[Richard C]

Regarding the Haas wing issue. I think they were in the high 20's (maybe 27 or 29 laps???) when they had the wing issue. They ended the day with only 31 laps, so not many laps on the replacement wing and I don't think they were running at the end of the day as their lap count stopped increasing at some point. So it will be interesting to see what happens with them tomorrow.

Richard

[Born Racer]

Originally Posted by BertMk2

Note: All of the above should be taken with the caveat that it's only testing

That caveat could be my signature for the next month or so.

[JeremySmith]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Have to say some of the front wings getting more and more complicated. The McLaren one looks amazing or ridiculous depnding on which way your view on aero is!

Take a lQQk at the Red Bull ... Rather silly that front wing !

[chillibowl]

looks like SV is having some fun with the new ultra softs.

obviously testing so who knows whats going on but he set a 1m22.810s on the ultra softs and the fastest lap last year during quali was a 1:24.681

new engines, new parts, new tires etc but it looks like the cars will be faster this year.

[Mike Harte]

Regardless of how others may think, Mercedes obviously believe that it is important that their two race drivers, not wanna-be pay drivers whose only experience may be in a simulator, put as many miles under their belts as possible. So far, in just two days, they have, between them, racked up more laps than a six Grand Prix lengths.

It must be to the benefit of not only the teams, but the drivers as well; there should be no surprises, and it will the two to provide all important feed back to the engineers.

Don't be surprised if Mercedes picks up the spoils again.

[chillibowl]

in fairness though, with the exception of FI, aren't all the teams exclusively using their race drivers for this test?

agreed though that the amount of laps Merc have put down in two days is impressive. and from what i have read its all long runs so we havent seen a hint of their true form yet.