The TV direction was fantastic this weekend. Battles throughout the field, minimal celebrities, fans, or others during the race, and some wide angle shots. The helicopter footage for the battle between LeClerc and Norris was particularly sublime. I hope your internal metrics show how much this is appreciated from the fans watching the race at home. Hope to see it carried forward. Cheers.

What are some F1 myths or misconceptions that you still see people believing today?

It can be anything about the drivers, teams, cars, rules or even things that people keep repeating whenever there's an argument about F1.

For example, people saying a good driver can win in any car, pay drivers have no talent, or a driver is bad just because his teammate is beating him. Another one is people accusing a team of cheating just because their car suddenly becomes much faster.

Lance Stroll is another example. People keep saying he is only in F1 because his father owns the team, but how much of it is actually true? Are there other misconceptions about him, like people saying he has no talent or that he has never shown any good performances?

What are some other examples you've seen, whether it's about stroll or other drivers, and what's the actual truth behind these myths?

I am a 43 year old mum in the UK and had zero of F1 all my life...in fact the noise actively annoyed me when anyone had it on...then my 13 year old son became obsessed and is a huge verstappen fan. I started watching it by accident and well now I am hooked.....

However I am really struggling to stick to who I should be supporting... I'm British and my name is Williams so should be easy...British team and it is my name. British racers like Bearman I root for but just not feeling Haas and as much as I love Russell I'm not really a Mercedes gal....however my absolute favourite driver due to their personality and hilarious radio comms is Leclerc. He is like my spirit animal when he drives....

So tell me how did you decide? Was it like football where you inherit a team based on father? You went for your country's car manufacturer? Or just really liked a particular driver?

I love Leclerc but I don't know if I'm a glam enough showy Ferrari gal....🫠🤣 and is it a faux pas to not support your country? I know Hamilton is British but he doesn't half wind me up...

Meet Ivica Perić from Grabovina near Čapljine, ever since he attended the race where Senna lost his life he swore that he will never miss a race in Italy again and for the last decade he has always been in the first row waving the flag of the Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia with Čapljina written over it. Second picture is from this year. Monza lore update😁

Thought it was a bit strange that a post on the front page with upward of 20k upvotes, several media outlets. and F1's official social media channels have talked about how Gasly is the only driver to not have cost his team any money in terms of damages, but this is not quite true. Seems like all of these posts go back to this one source on the r/formula1 subreddit, a post talking about the World Destructors Championship. But, examining the data points to some omissions and mistakes. To start off:

• Gasly did get floor damage in Suzuka, when he and Ocon came together on the first restart lap. Ironically enough, F1 themselves have a interview pen video of Gasly talking about said damage costing him about >30 points of downforce. We don't know if this floor was completely replaced or just fixed, but this alone makes it so that Gasly did cost his team some money in repairs.

• But if we ignore minor floor damage, Gasly did have a precautionary front wing change in Monaco after his clash with Ocon during lap 1, and there were some repairs ongoing to the front right side of his car. But, as there was no visible damage to the front wing or the front right side of the car, honestly this one shouldn't count.

• Finally, if we do ignore minor floor damage completely, there is one other driver with no damage sustained through the season: Lewis Hamilton. Hamilton did spin in Austin, but besides gravel rash on the underside of the car, the car itself was completely fine and nothing was replaced. His only other incident was in Austria lap 1 turn 1, when he was ushered wide by Sainz onto the sausage kerb on the exit of turn 1, which resulted in floor damage that cost him about 0.25s/lap. Lewis did say in the post-race interview that he felt that there was a touch from Sainz on his sidepod, but looking at the replays of the onboards, they never came close enough to touch. The original World Destructors Championship post also noted Hamilton got about 320k worth of damage in Austria, 225k worth of floor damage and presumably, 95k worth of sidepod damage (which is not true). The same post also ignored Gasly's floor damage in Japan for some reason.

• Over a full season, Bottas almost came close to then being technically the driver with the least damage with just 125k worth of damage according to the same post, but well, we all saw what happened in Abu Dhabi 2024.

(None of these damage estimates count reliability issues, which I think is completely fair).

I know it doesn't really matter, I mean it's just a random statistic, but feels odd for a post from Reddit to go mainstream and then end up back on Reddit, and for the said random statistic to still be wrong. Feels like journalists should be doing a bit more research before they publish things.

FYI: I could've missed damage for any of the drivers mentioned, so don't take me as gospel.

Hi all,

So I wanted to just post this to save myself from posting in multiple threads and repeating myself.

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Also because I dont want this sub to be an absolute storm of anger at the car launches.

So I work as a supplier in the F1 industry for a couple of teams - I also have close ties to people who are within the industry.

THe car launches are going to be very uninteresting - (with the exception of Haas and Mclaren) we are only going to see the FIA Show car with the respective livery.

Why? Let me show you

So at silverstone the FIA revealed the "2022" car - this was an initial reveal for the teams to get an idea of what the FIA was expecting and also a show car for the teams to "BUY" these chassis from the FIA for the purpose of promoting themselves for the 2022 season.

Mercedes have bought 8 for this purpose same as ferrari.

Alpine have bought 3
aston martin have also bought 3
red bull bought some, but the number is unkown to myself.

The only exception to this is quite possibly Mclaren - who on friday will be revealing something like Haas did - an early stage development of their car but their final car will be at Bahrain (see the article about bringing a huge update package) for reference.

I just want to make this clear to the sub - so we dont have threads popping up saying this years cars are "boring because they all look the same" after the reveals. Be patient /r/Formula1 we're in for some incredible suprises

Some will be at Barcelona - but the big finale will be at Bahrain testing when we will see what these regulations are Truly about

If you want any proof from me, DM me, I wouldn't make these claims without having evidence to back it up.

Edit: See below, mods have verified who I am as I have provided them with proof.

Edit2: I’ve had to do an edit because I’ve realised the last sentence of my post is easily misunderstood, a lot of people messaging me assuming I have proof relating to the cars, this is not true, I only have proof of who I am as evidence of my claims not being pulled out of thin air, hope this clears that up. Cheers

So earlier today u/Shezoplay1 noted that Lando was doing a “steering sweep” during his running at the test this week.

I was part of the team at RBR that (AFAIK) invented this technique. I have been out of F1 for a few years now and it is clearly no longer proprietary info, so I thought I would share some insights behind the technique and what it’s trying to achieve.

First off, let’s start with a primer, for context.

What is aero mapping?

An aero map, simply put, is a multi-dimensional model that attempts to model the aerodynamic response of the car (typically in terms of SCL and aero balance) against a set of variables. Each of these variables adds a dimension to said model.

SCL is our basic currency of downforce, measured in non-dimensional terms. It is a variant of CL (i.e. lift coefficient) but with no “Area” in the equation. For the mathematically inclined, SCL = Lift / (0.5 x air density x velocity ² )

SCL is made up of SCLf (front axle) and SCLr (rear axle). Aero balance is simply SCLf/SCL, ie the percentage of total load that is going through the front axle.

The dimensions that go into a typical model consist of things like: ride height (FRH and RRH), yaw, steer, roll. These were the well known variables, but at the same time aerodynamicists knew that these did not fully “explain” the variation of aerodynamics from one car state to another, because models trained purely on these variables did not provide great correlation. In the late 2000s, other new variables like curvature were starting to gain consideration in the correlation question. We’ll leave some of the others for another day.

So what is curvature?

Simply put, curvature is the reciprocal of corner radius, i.e. 1/r. Sharp low speed corners have high curvature, 130R has low curvature. Corners with curvature impart a curved flowfield on a car (crosswind yaw at the front, conventional yaw at the rear) and this is unqiuely different from the effects of pure yaw (all wind is coming from the same direction) and steer.

The issue with curvature is that it is very difficult to recreate in the wind tunnel (also another story for another day) due to the straight tunnel walls by definition imparting 0 curvature on the flow, and so you can only really model it in CFD. This is one of the many reasons why wind tunnel outputs have different flow physics from CFD ones, btw. However, the wind tunnel is by far the better of the two environments for building an aero map from, because you can have hundreds of test points to create your aero map from, for a given spec of car.

So, the result of this is that your aero map is compromised, it knows nothing about curvature. This is not great, because your aero map is your core manual for understanding your car. You feed this map into all your sims, your ride height optimisation models, etc. it is the single most important numerical output of the aero department.

Introducing the track mapping experiment

This is when RBR introduced the track mapping exercise. Why not build an aero map using the real car? You can measure pressures continuously on the aero sensors, so all that is needed is a track “trajectory” that covers the full range of values that each of your aero map dimensions typically cover. That should, in principle, give you enough “coverage” in your map to build a model from.

So where does the steer sweep come in?

Steer angle is something the wind tunnel shows very high SCL sensitivity to. The wind tunnel model allows you to independently sweep the steer angle while holding all other variables constant.

This is much harder to do on track. However, we do see a very wide range of steer angles on a track trajectory. The important thing to note is that on track, this range of steer angles is highly coupled with curvature and somewhat highly coupled with ride height. So you only get very high steer on track in conjunction with high FRH and high curvature.

This is what the sweep solves: we can now log a full range of steer angles while holding FRH and curvature roughly constant - this allows our model to better differentiate the aero effects created by the steer effect, from those created by curvature, ride height, etc.

The technique itself involves the driver overslipping the tyre, by sharply sawing at the wheel (usually 3-4 “spikes” in the steer trace per low speed corner). The sharp and transient nature of the sweep means the front end doesn’t grip up and the actual trajectory (and therefore curvature) around the corner is almost unaffected.

This post would be way better with some graphics, so I apologise for not providing these!

EDIT:

FAQs from the comments

Isn't this what Fernando has been doing for years?

We are talking about two very different things, albeit both involving aggressive steering.

As far as I understand, ALO uses an aggressive initial steer angle (once) on corner entry, generating high slip angles and inducing higher mechanical grip in cornering. I don't know much about tyres (black magic to me) but that's the basic principle.

What the aero mapping technique described here is doing is creating 3-4 instances of very high steer within the space of one corner to measure the aerodynamic effect of steer angle on floor aerodynamics. The instances of high steer are too short and sharp to generate a mechanical grip response.

Why care about de-coupling steer and curvature in the map, when these are practically coupled in reality?

A few reasons:

(1) The aero philosophy at RBR was historically to develop benign aero characteristics, in excess of what the car is likely to see on track. This ensures a stable and consistent aero platform across the most extreme conditions - this is basically what allowed RBR to develop the high rake car - the yaw/steer/roll response at the combination of extreme ride heights (low front, high rear) was relatively benign and the team kept pushing this limit as far as it could go. To do this effectively you want to de-couple all your aeromap variables to understand which physical effects are causing non-linear aero behaviours, at the aero map extrema, so you can replicate them in CFD/tunnel and then design your way out of them. With the steer effect isolated from the curvature, you can also have greater faith in your SCL vs Steer graph that is coming from the wind tunnel, where most of the design iteration is happening.

(2) Curvature and steer are coupled, but not by a fixed ratio. The steer vs curvature graph when plotted from on-track data, across different tracks, tyres, track temperatures, etc is not a straight line but somewhat cone shaped. So, if you want your aero map to recreate that cone, you need your training data to have some decoupling within it.

Hi, guys! I'm not completely sure if this kind of post is allowed here, but, if you don't mind, I'd like to share a story with you involving a specific event of the São Paulo GP.

I am a 22-year-old Brazilian student (F), and I had the opportunity to be at my first GP (and also at my first sports event) last weekend. I started to follow F1 during the pandemics, much because of this subreddit, which helped me a lot to understand a lot about the sport. On Saturday, as some of you may remember, Norris turned 22 years old, and I, who am also a big Taylor Swift fan, made a sign in celebration of his birthday, making a pun with the song "22" ("I don't know about you, but Lando is [probably] feeling 22"). A reporter from a well-known website saw me with the sign and did an interview with me. I was thrilled because it was the first time I'd ever done an interview in my life and even more for such a big website. The subject of the report was the female audience in F1, and how women are becoming more and more present in the world of motorsports in Brazil.

Yesterday, I made the mistake of looking for the article on Twitter. When I read the comments, I was amazed by the number of guys taking my lines and saying I'm not a real fan because of parts where I say I don't have a favorite driver (I really don't, although there are some drivers I identify with more than others) or because I say I like Norris because I think he's cool, young and cute (and I didn't lie, but I don't think that's all: he's a fuckin' outstanding driver and I really admire the fact that he talks openly about mental health in such a sincere way, besides the fact that I can relate to the fact that we're the same age), guys implying that I'm a daddy's girl when I paid for my ticket with MY money, guys calling me and the other girls in the report "Mary gasoline" (basically a hanger-on). It got me completely PISSED, but not because they were using things I said to talk shit about me or other women. What really pissed me off was when I realized that if it was a man saying the things I and the other girls in the interview said, he would hardly be called a "fake fan".

I decided to do a post on the subject because I believe it's past time to think about the way we treat female fans in motorsports. I have heard many reports of women being harassed in other areas of the track and I have seen men accompanied by beautiful women being called "cuckolds" (simply because they are beautiful women???). This needs to end, NOW. I'm simply tired. This was one of the most fantastic weekends of my life, but things like this make me very sad. It's really frustrating to feel inferior and have the impression that your steps and your lines need to be minutely calculated in relation to something you love so much just because of your gender. I love Formula One, I love following all the weekend sessions, I always access this subreddit to read and make some comments, and all I want, for myself and for all the other women who are F1 fans like me, is to be respected, regardless of our gender. I don't have all the answers, I'm not the biggest F1 fan out there, I still have a lot to learn and study about the sport, but I AM an F1 fan, and I won't allow anyone to say that I or anyone else is not a fan of the sport. Gatekeeping is ridiculous enough on its own, but gatekeeping because of someone’s gender isn't just ridiculous, it's disgusting and fucking misogynistic.

That's basically it. And, if I may, I'll leave a phrase in Portuguese: respeita as mina, porra!

Ah, and if you still allow me, also some words from our beloved Valtteri Bottas: to whom it may concern, fuck you!

TLDR: stop saying women aren't "real" motorsport fans. Thank you.

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Edit: thank you so so so much for all your support! I can't answer all the comments, but it's lovely to see so many nice people reaching out to show that we, women, aren't alone in this battle. To the people saying "hurr durr your first mistake was going to Twitter": this isn't a Twitter problem or a social media problem. It's a real-world problem that many female fans have to deal with every single time they are talking about their interests. And to the 1% of guys saying bullshit in the comments: please, read the Bottas quote again. Thank you!

Edit 2: guys, I'm so, so sorry, but it's being really hard (and a little bit overwhelming, not gonna lie) to follow up on all comments. I appreciate every single one of you who took the time to say something (unless you came here to say bullshit. In this case... Bottas quote once again). Thanks for the words, and please, don't treat this post as an isolated case or a social media episode. If you read at least 10% of the comments, you'll see it's unfortunately more common than you think. Take care, everybody, and feel safe and comfortable to reach me on my PMs <3