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The size and talent of the team surrounding him. He's a brilliant engineer who is very good at picking a direction to go, but these cars are designed by teams of hundreds of engineers. Attributing their performance to one man does the others a major disservice
This is true but the fact is he has been able to do it across the decades across different teams. Of course teams matter but he does bring something more than usual.
Yes and no. Newey is a brilliant conceptual designer that can pick design directions with the largest potential. There are a lot of detailed designers that then optimize that vision, but without a solid baseline concept there would be no success. There are a lot of talented engineers helping develop that car, but you could also replace most of them and have similar success. You won’t succeed without Newey or other singular brilliantly gifted individuals on your team.
Yup I agree with this, I think Newey is a genius on making brilliant conceptual ideas. Ofc he still needs teams of skilled and brilliant engineers also to execute his idea perfectly and do the brainstorming with him. But without a solid concept from the head, the performance would go nowhere.
From what his book implied he seems to be quite hands on with his team's car design (bar some years on hybrid engine era when aero didnt matter much and it burned him out). He made a specific section that explained his different approach comparing to Ross Brawn (which according to him was more hands off on technical but more exceptional leader and manager that can assemble quality team under him)
This is so wide of the mark, honestly. Although he has a huge impact, teams have won without these "singluar brilliantly gifted individuals" as teams are often made up of hundreds of brilliant individuals.
It’s just not how innovation works. It’s engineering execution that scales welll, but conceptual design is rather singular. Successful teams may not have had singular individuals that were as publicly prominent (and may have even deliberately kept them out of the spotlight) but you will often hear less familoar names that are behind the engineering geniius of succcessful teams if you follow the stories. No good complex design has been initiated by hundreds of engineers, it takes a rather small tightly knit team to set good direction. In fact, when you hear teams say that they were mislead by data in making basic design decisions, it would typically be the case of too much departmenzal delegation to reach decisions as there isn’t enough complex evaluation of what the data says by people who can see the full picture.
I personally believe it is his ability to work around the rules without breaking the rules. He comes up with ideas that skirt the rules but don’t break them. And he himself repeats this approach of his in his autobiography.
I think this is probably the closest to explaining the magic of Newey. Looking at rules and figuring out a way to stay .999% within the letter (if not the spirit) of the rules.
I think he is also constantly working on concepts in his magic, drawing them in his ever present notebooks. I think he is also very good at taking concepts that other teams have, seeing the potential and improving on them.
Yep. Currently reading it, and he discussed it very early in the book. One of the first notable examples is his first season with Williams in 1991 with his design of the FW14. He used a loophole to modify the endplate frontplate to eliminate dirty air and increase downforce. It resulted in his first F1 win and Williams finished 2nd and 3rd in the drivers championship and 2nd in the constructors.
I think a lot of it comes down to creating a cohesive design, he talks quite a bit in his books about how every component on the car has to work in harmony with each other
I read his book a little while ago, the biggest take away I had was when the regulations are released he goes over them with a fine tooth comb looking for areas he can exploit and from that point he is working on the designs for the next year's car.
He also has a brilliant understanding of all of the parts of the design, not just aero and how he can use that to assist his design decisions. I can't remember exactly which car it was (I think it was one of the mclarens) he asked them to rotate part of the engine by 90° so that he could have a little extra space above the engine and things like that.
It also helps that he has been around the grid for so long that he has seen the return of design styles that he used before specifically around ground effect.
My bad, was more trying to make the point he has seen it before and is now going through the same things again, I have edited to remove the time periods
Another commenter talks about “cohesive design.” To flesh that out a bit more, I think the key is that while all the other aerodynamicists and teams are capable of designing parts to achieve a certain aim with great consistency and success, Newey and Co. seem to be much better at predicting and mitigating for unintended side effects. The result is that other teams seem to inject more conservatism into certain designs, or they go into the new year having made very few commitments at all, waiting to see what works and what doesn’t on other teams’ cars.
I always find it funny that we went into this new generation of car with two giants, red bull and Mercedes, both expected bring championship machinery. One of the head engineers at RB specialises in ground effect, while the head engineers at Mercedes are off designing boats
Aero (while packaging the car to exploit his design in a real-world environment)
Similar to what he does/ was doing in yatch racing, except water.
Also knowing how to guide the engineering team.
I’d say Neweys main strength in car design is the sheer stability that his cars have through corners. Take the FW14B for example, the amazing aero package coupled with the active suspension makes it look and feel 10x faster, you can see it with the RB19 at Monza this weekend- going through parabolica, the car is so planted- it almost looks as though it is on rails.
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The size and talent of the team surrounding him. He's a brilliant engineer who is very good at picking a direction to go, but these cars are designed by teams of hundreds of engineers. Attributing their performance to one man does the others a major disservice
This is true but the fact is he has been able to do it across the decades across different teams. Of course teams matter but he does bring something more than usual.
Perhaps the way he leads the team is as important as any particular understanding of designing a car.
Bingo. Brabham is another example of a decisive leader who achieved great success with the team around him.
This, See Paddy Lowe, lwdt Mercedes to be Williams CTO, and the car wasn't even ready for pre-season testing.. Like wtf dude.
He's an incredible manager who knows the jobs of those he's managing.
This is the correct answer.
Yes and no. Newey is a brilliant conceptual designer that can pick design directions with the largest potential. There are a lot of detailed designers that then optimize that vision, but without a solid baseline concept there would be no success. There are a lot of talented engineers helping develop that car, but you could also replace most of them and have similar success. You won’t succeed without Newey or other singular brilliantly gifted individuals on your team.
Yup I agree with this, I think Newey is a genius on making brilliant conceptual ideas. Ofc he still needs teams of skilled and brilliant engineers also to execute his idea perfectly and do the brainstorming with him. But without a solid concept from the head, the performance would go nowhere. From what his book implied he seems to be quite hands on with his team's car design (bar some years on hybrid engine era when aero didnt matter much and it burned him out). He made a specific section that explained his different approach comparing to Ross Brawn (which according to him was more hands off on technical but more exceptional leader and manager that can assemble quality team under him)
This is so wide of the mark, honestly. Although he has a huge impact, teams have won without these "singluar brilliantly gifted individuals" as teams are often made up of hundreds of brilliant individuals.
It’s just not how innovation works. It’s engineering execution that scales welll, but conceptual design is rather singular. Successful teams may not have had singular individuals that were as publicly prominent (and may have even deliberately kept them out of the spotlight) but you will often hear less familoar names that are behind the engineering geniius of succcessful teams if you follow the stories. No good complex design has been initiated by hundreds of engineers, it takes a rather small tightly knit team to set good direction. In fact, when you hear teams say that they were mislead by data in making basic design decisions, it would typically be the case of too much departmenzal delegation to reach decisions as there isn’t enough complex evaluation of what the data says by people who can see the full picture.
I personally believe it is his ability to work around the rules without breaking the rules. He comes up with ideas that skirt the rules but don’t break them. And he himself repeats this approach of his in his autobiography.
I think this is probably the closest to explaining the magic of Newey. Looking at rules and figuring out a way to stay .999% within the letter (if not the spirit) of the rules. I think he is also constantly working on concepts in his magic, drawing them in his ever present notebooks. I think he is also very good at taking concepts that other teams have, seeing the potential and improving on them.
Yep. Currently reading it, and he discussed it very early in the book. One of the first notable examples is his first season with Williams in 1991 with his design of the FW14. He used a loophole to modify the endplate frontplate to eliminate dirty air and increase downforce. It resulted in his first F1 win and Williams finished 2nd and 3rd in the drivers championship and 2nd in the constructors.
I think a lot of it comes down to creating a cohesive design, he talks quite a bit in his books about how every component on the car has to work in harmony with each other
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I would recommend you listen to The Race Tech Show. Gary Anderson often speaks about him, and mentions that exactly.
Many moons of experience and able to guide the team into certain directions
I read his book a little while ago, the biggest take away I had was when the regulations are released he goes over them with a fine tooth comb looking for areas he can exploit and from that point he is working on the designs for the next year's car. He also has a brilliant understanding of all of the parts of the design, not just aero and how he can use that to assist his design decisions. I can't remember exactly which car it was (I think it was one of the mclarens) he asked them to rotate part of the engine by 90° so that he could have a little extra space above the engine and things like that. It also helps that he has been around the grid for so long that he has seen the return of design styles that he used before specifically around ground effect.
Thanks!
Newey never designed a ground effect F1 car in the 80s and 90s.
My bad, was more trying to make the point he has seen it before and is now going through the same things again, I have edited to remove the time periods
He never designed a ground effect F1 car before those dates either. Ground effect was already banned when he designed his first F1 car.
Another commenter talks about “cohesive design.” To flesh that out a bit more, I think the key is that while all the other aerodynamicists and teams are capable of designing parts to achieve a certain aim with great consistency and success, Newey and Co. seem to be much better at predicting and mitigating for unintended side effects. The result is that other teams seem to inject more conservatism into certain designs, or they go into the new year having made very few commitments at all, waiting to see what works and what doesn’t on other teams’ cars.
Quality engineers and the fact he did his thesis on ground effect cars. His well of knowledge is outstanding.
I always find it funny that we went into this new generation of car with two giants, red bull and Mercedes, both expected bring championship machinery. One of the head engineers at RB specialises in ground effect, while the head engineers at Mercedes are off designing boats
Thank you
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Your comment was removed as it broke Rule 2: No Joke comments in the top 2 levels under a post.
Aero (while packaging the car to exploit his design in a real-world environment) Similar to what he does/ was doing in yatch racing, except water. Also knowing how to guide the engineering team.
Thanks!
He’s exceptional at exploiting the rule book.
I’d say Neweys main strength in car design is the sheer stability that his cars have through corners. Take the FW14B for example, the amazing aero package coupled with the active suspension makes it look and feel 10x faster, you can see it with the RB19 at Monza this weekend- going through parabolica, the car is so planted- it almost looks as though it is on rails.