[Official] Driver of the Grand Prix: Made in Italy Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix 2021

[crmalcolm]

Originally Posted by 52Paddy

Ah, so quite a few lengths are considered before the pit-lane speed limit and after you can put the power down again.

What seems interesting to me is that a lot of focus will be made on saving fractions of a second when stationary (understandably so) - but in commentary there seems to be a generalisation at each event that the pit lane will cost X seconds. To me, it looks like just as many fractions can be gained on pit entry/exit as when stationary.

If you compare pit stops:
Bottas' stop was timed at 2.24 seconds, whereas Verstappen's quckest was 2.27s. But, in comparing pit times, Verstappen was 0.358s qquicker.

Ocon recorded a pit stop time of 2.33 seconds, but his pit time was 30.652s - or 0.843s slower than Verstappen.

Why do I think it is interesting - despite only being 1/10th slower in the pit box, Ocon was nearly a second longer in the pit lane. The team can cost a driver a lot of time if they get it wrong, but the driver can also make big difference in their pit entry/exit result. Next time we see a driver trying to get out of the pits and retain a place by a few fractions of a second - their own driving may also be a factor.