Quote:
Originally Posted by V8 Fireworks
It's not a good look to do laptimes comparable to low-powered lightweight GP3 or F3 cars despite running 700hp monsters -- it reeks of inefficiency, but low downforce will do that for you.
It's a tricky one -- downforce (primarily a more aggressive floor) would make the Indycar go fast and would cost little to add to the cars, but then the racing would be poor. Yet, as is, the Indycars don't seem slow at circuits like Road America or Mid-Ohio. Hmmm.
PS.
While the Indycars aren't as lightweight as a (classic) F3 (just 500kg!), the Indycar weight is very similar to a modern F1 car weight, so the weight itself isn't the differentiator.
|
Currently IndyCars weigh, approximately 1,620 pounds (road/street/short oval configuration) and 1,590 pounds (speedway configuration), without fuel, driver and driver weight equivalent.
I was looking at lap times over the years, on some tracks. For example, Hélio Castroneves broke the lap record at Long Beach in 2017, with a time of 1:06.225, 106.980 mph (172.167 km/h). This year Alexander Rossi took pole with a time of 1:06.5528, 106.454 mph (171.321 km/h).
Dario Franchitti, has held the lap record at Road America since 2000, with a time of 1:39.866, 145.924 mph (234.84 km/h). In 2017, the last year of the manufacturer's aero-kits, Helio Castroneves, took pole with a time of 1:41.3007, 143.85 mph (231.52 km/h). This year, Josef Newgarden took pole with a time of 1:43.2026, 140.02 mph (225.34 lm/h).
At Detroit, Takuma Sato, set the lap record in 2017, with a time of 1:13.6732, 114.831 mph (184.802 km/h). In Race 1 Marco Andretti took pole with a time of 1:14.8514, 113.024 mph (181.894 km/h). It rained in Qualifying for Race 2, so the time and speed is irrelevant.
The UAK is a little slower than the manufacturer aero-kits but overall, those times and speeds look very respectable. I can only think that the lap times at COTA were to do with the nature of the tyre test, rather than the cars actually being much slower.