[WEC Race] WEC 2015 Round 1: Silverstone

[Adam43]

I think you are confused. Church is a corner at Thruxton, Chapel is at Silverstone leading on to the Hanger straight.

[Ginaro Zukovsky]

Originally Posted by Chiana

Awful TV viewership figures are in

Motors TV 11,000 (peak 24,000) for 0.1
Fox Sports 1 121,000

N/A for partial Eurosport and streaming

Where did you get the MotorsTV figures from? http://www.barb.co.uk/whats-new/weekly-top-10? doesn't include WEC. Although Motors did record their highest weekly reach since the last week of January.

By contrast, BTCC round 1 got 373,000 viewers on ITV4.

[chunder]

I really do think that WEC should abandon tv completely

It seems to me Endurance are so obssessed with their sport they will travel to teh races anyway?

From the UK you can easily get to three venues. So why pay for the coverage.

If true those figures are truly awful, from the bits I saw between MotoGP races Motors didnt even have any advertising, they were just promoting their own station

Do ACO own Motors aswell by any chance!

[bella]

no, but iirc motors are french owned and the french stick together.

i think there's merit for showing endurance racing on telly. silverstone showed there's loads of action going on throughout the field, and with a good commentary team you can keep viewers better up to date than they would be trackside.

[Adam43]

Originally Posted by chunder

It seems to me Endurance are so obssessed with their sport they will travel to teh races anyway?

I'm only going to two of them.
How many traveled to the racing? 45,000 over three days at Silverstone, so some are those are repeats. That's it. How many on race day 30,000? It felt less!

From the UK you can easily get to three venues. So why pay for the coverage.

To see the others?

If true those figures are truly awful, from the bits I saw between MotoGP races Motors didnt even have any advertising, they were just promoting their own station

Do ACO own Motors aswell by any chance!

I'd rather not watch than watch on MotorsTV. It hurts my eyes. Another reason to pay for the coverage. Although watching away from home is good for me.

Whatever, it's good to have choice. You rule out options by not having it covered.

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by chunder

I really do think that WEC should abandon tv completely

It seems to me Endurance are so obssessed with their sport they will travel to teh races anyway?

From the UK you can easily get to three venues. So why pay for the coverage.

If true those figures are truly awful, from the bits I saw between MotoGP races Motors didnt even have any advertising, they were just promoting their own station

Do ACO own Motors aswell by any chance!

Sorry but this idea is very silly. We won't have it on TV and expect all fans to travel to all races. I can't afford to get every race (and usually not even 1!) and I won't get enough time off work to do it. I also have a life outside motorsport. But I pay for the WEC coverage and will continue to.

[Deleted]

Originally Posted by Ginaro Zukovsky

Where did you get the MotorsTV figures from? http://www.barb.co.uk/whats-new/weekly-top-10? doesn't include WEC. Although Motors did record their highest weekly reach since the last week of January.

By contrast, BTCC round 1 got 373,000 viewers on ITV4.

https://f1broadcasting.wordpress.com...ory/motors-tv/

[lemansfan]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/wec-ma...7651605390110/


First Pics are Uploaded ( Pitwalk & inside Pits )

[GT6]

Nice pictures Walter, but i think you should have restrained from the grid girl ones, you know what a ridiculous debate we have had on those recently.

[Deleted]

No-one should be restrained from anything if the photographed subject in question is posing for you.

So ACO says having grid girls is bad because it's 'thing of the past'. Which you can agree or disagree with. Yet they still hire girls with WEC-branding posing in other parts of the weekend, even their own autographs session by the look of things. And in the ELMS race all the traditional stuff is still there with TV cameras locked in. So I guess it's OK in some instances but not in another? Hey look we are so 'modern' and 'innovative' - ocassionally. They don't obey even their own arguments.

(and no, the actual debate thread has been locked, so that's why this is here)

[Adam43]

We've done with grid girls discussion thanks. It ran its course, people got silly. That's why we are taking a break from it. Let's give it some time. People need more practice at discussing in a public forum before we go there again.
Whatever, it wasn't closed to move it to another thread that it can derail.

[lemansfan]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/wec-ma...7651610584628/

Pics from the Race uploaded

[Articus]

Why were the Audi's fastest laps so close to their qualifying laps yet everyone else was 2-3 seconds slower than qualy at best in the race?

Even though the Porsche were phenomenal in the straights, how did the Audi's manage to grab best sector times in all 3 sectors.

Leading to my last question, why couldn't Porsche or Toyota be bothered to bring an appropriate aero kit to the track?

[cokata]

Originally Posted by Articus

Why were the Audi's fastest laps so close to their qualifying laps yet everyone else was 2-3 seconds slower than qualy at best in the race?

Even though the Porsche were phenomenal in the straights, how did the Audi's manage to grab best sector times in all 3 sectors.

Leading to my last question, why couldn't Porsche or Toyota be bothered to bring an appropriate aero kit to the track?

Aero efficiency of the Audi was much better than the other two.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=As8rrwAvF7o

Look at this video. When the porsche isn't boosting, it is barely any quicker than the Audi in a straight line, but it has much less downforce,

Also you can hear a strange noise from the Audi before some of the braking zones, and looking at the FIA telemetry it shows the car was on full throttle and it stops accelerating. I would guess that they are having trouble harvesting their full hybrid allowance at silverstone and have to harvest before the braking zones.

At other tracks they wouldn't need to do that and their advantage would be even bigger. Expect them to have more downforce and higher top speed than Porsche at Le Mans. They have truly made a beast of a car.

[J Jay]

Speaking about downforce, an interesting observation from Paul Truswell (who else) on MWM - the top speeds are all down compared to last year's dry running.

[cokata]

Originally Posted by J Jay

Speaking about downforce, an interesting observation from Paul Truswell (who else) on MWM - the top speeds are all down compared to last year's dry running.

Audi was actually quicker this year, but they were harvesting at the point of the Speed trap, so it looks like they were slower. Porsche were running with the Le Mans bodykit last year, now they were with their WEC kit i believe. Only toyota were down a little on '14, and that's another black mark for them considering they are the only ones to remain in the same MJ class (they get the same amount of fuel as they did last year).

[Mal]

Originally Posted by cokata

Audi was actually quicker this year, but they were harvesting at the point of the Speed trap, so it looks like they were slower. Porsche were running with the Le Mans bodykit last year, now they were with their WEC kit i believe. Only toyota were down a little on '14, and that's another black mark for them considering they are the only ones to remain in the same MJ class (they get the same amount of fuel as they did last year).

I dont see why it is a black mark for Toyota - their lap times were faster so if the straight speeds are similar they must have improved their speeds in the twisty bits which presumably means they are using more downforce.

[cokata]

Originally Posted by Mal

I dont see why it is a black mark for Toyota - their lap times were faster so if the straight speeds are similar they must have improved their speeds in the twisty bits which presumably means they are using more downforce.

Of course they are quicker, i think they aero is second to the Audi (L/D), but they have by far the least improved power train of the 3. They have barely made any gains on the hybrid side, and yet have kept the same engine.

As a basic rule for any engine is that even if you keep the same architecture, you can improve the efficiency by increasing the displacement and reducing the RPM, like they did in '14 (3.4->3.7 liter). You would have thought that not going to a higher MJ class would give them enough weight to play with in order to bump the displacement somewhat.

[TF110]

You deducted that after one race. And it was Silverstone, where hybrids cant fully recharge under braking. Thats why Audi was so good. Because they rely the least on hybrid power, plus have a diesel with huge torque. Running the downforce they did can be done with their powertrainpackage. Theyve always had that advantage at Silverstone. Porsche was fast and efficient with the ers-h helping their recovery. So they can use the turbo to recharge the battery instead of only the brakes.

[cokata]

Originally Posted by TF110

You deducted that after one race. And it was Silverstone, where hybrids cant fully recharge under braking. Thats why Audi was so good. Because they rely the least on hybrid power, plus have a diesel with huge torque. Running the downforce they did can be done with their powertrainpackage. Theyve always had that advantage at Silverstone. Porsche was fast and efficient with the ers-h helping their recovery. So they can use the turbo to recharge the battery instead of only the brakes.

I thought that now they can fully recover 6mj, which was supposed to be almost like going to a higher MJ class for them, and yet they still can't recover that. Porsche did a much better job on the hybrid side, don't you think?

[TF110]

Originally Posted by cokata

I thought that now they can fully recover 6mj, which was supposed to be almost like going to a higher MJ class for them, and yet they still can't recover that. Porsche did a much better job on the hybrid side, don't you think?

No way can they recover 6mj from only braking at Silverstone. Seems they cant get 4mj either. We know Porsche did a better job. And thats because they dont rely solely on braking to harvest energy. I dont even think F1 cars could generate enough kinetic energy to reach that level of power. I think Porsche got more, but I wouldnt be surprised if they didnt reach their allotted total either.

[Ephaeton]

Originally Posted by cokata

Also you can hear a strange noise from the Audi before some of the braking zones, and looking at the FIA telemetry it shows ...

Where'd you get the FIA telemetry data from? I want to comb through it!

[GasperG]

To continue from my thinking in Toyota thread.

Porsche was doing 29-30 laps per stint, that gave them one less pit stop, but lets say that their race pace suffered from this fuel saving strategy and was in the 1:44 region or roughly same as #1 Toyota, how come they didn't double stint their tyres? In case there would be another FCY, Porsche strategy of one pit stop less would do no good, they would end up behind.

On the other hand Audi was in bigger advantage than it would seem, they just lost some valuable time with starting problems, not pitting in FCY and because of that stop and go penalty. Otherwise with their race pace they would lap anyone else.

[J Jay]

The only conclusion I can see is that Porsche knew they couldn't make the tyres last significantly more than a stint, so running lean to save a fuel stop wasn't just about getting the jump on Audi/Toyota; it was also limiting the time loss from having to change tyres at every stop.

As for Audi, they look better the deeper we dig into the minutiae, although the struggle to overtake the other cars (Lotterer aside) will still be a concern for them going to the Tilkedromes.

[Spyderman]

Originally Posted by J Jay

The only conclusion I can see is that Porsche knew they couldn't make the tyres last significantly more than a stint, so running lean to save a fuel stop wasn't just about getting the jump on Audi/Toyota; it was also limiting the time loss from having to change tyres at every stop..

Correct (and as I have pointed out in the Toyota thread). Until Porsche get their tire wear sorted out, they will have problems with their race pace (on non Le Mans tracks). The main reason they were so successful in Sao Paulo was due to the resurfacing of the track that was so kind to their tires.

Originally Posted by J Jay

As for Audi, they look better the deeper we dig into the minutiae, although the struggle to overtake the other cars (Lotterer aside) will still be a concern for them going to the Tilkedromes.

Audi are the team to beat. The real question is wether Porsche and Toyota will have improved their performances enough by Le Mans to be competitive (in race trim).