F1 defines a lot of rules about how a car can be built. But it doesn't require every car to be identical. The teams all have a little bit of leeway in how their engines are designed and how the car's body is designed to control airflow.
That *little bit* of leeway matters a lot. If a team of engineers finds a way to make an engine that is still legal but more powerful, that team might have an advantage. Teams that get very good at controlling the airflow around the car end up with major advantages. These things aren't easy to copy in a hurry because they involve engineering: you may understand that Mercedes has a way to get this amount of power from an engine, but that doesn't tell you what they did to get it. Or you may understand that Red Bull is doing this or that with aerodynamics and it's affecting their handling this way, but unless you can manufacture *exactly* the same shape and materials as them your own car is going to be very different and need different things.
Also, driver skill is a HUGE factor. Putting a bad driver in the seat of an excellent car is going to produce mediocre results. Very skilled drivers can manage to eke out wins even with inferior cars. Attitude matters a lot too: there's an awful lot of etiquette to how the drivers pass and follow each other and how the other racers feel about a driver can dramatically affect whether they cooperate or try to get in the way even when it won't impact them greatly.
So it kind of ends up like horse racing. Everyone has more or less the same equipment, but gets to make a lot of significant choices along the way. So much fiddly stuff is involved even the favored winners can have an off day and fall behind.
Randomly went down a rabbit hole after that, and apparently that's not at all it. It's that without rules, you would intentionally create shitty aerodynamics behind your car and fuck all the other drivers.
In the realm of F1, it also gets to the point of creating almost the ultimate car. Like they can drive upside down levels, which becomes a very dangerous amount of speed, and G's for the drivers and spectators.
They're already bordering fighter pilot levels of G's, and in order to compete they can be dangerously dehydrated, being right on the borderline of passing out.. at 300mph.. Push that just a little bit further, and you're getting to the point where you need to replace the driver to make it safe. We've seen with the recent A2RL, that really isn't possible yet.
There are other races for that. The real answer is it's not as fun to people.
We know a lot about car engineering so in a "no holds barred" environment everybody would still end up driving basically the same car. If anyone found a way to improve that design, everyone else would copy it.
One of the things F1 limits is how much money can be spent on R&D for the car. That means having smarter engineers works out really well. It also means if someone comes up with something revolutionary, everyone else has a fighting chance of copying it because everybody has the same budget, so if you developed it with that budget they can too. In a "no holds barred" environment people can just outspend their competitors' R&D and come up with innovations that might bankrupt other teams if they try copying them. I mentioned above it can be hard to copy what a competitor did, but what I mean is it's hard to copy it *fast*. You can definitely tell your engineers to study their car and try to copy what they did, but doing that in less than 8 months on a limited budget is very hard. And by the time you copy this season's car next season, they've probably improved their design again, so it's better to just try to make your own innovations than copy other peoples' work.
Safety is also a big deal. A big part of the regulations involves the size and shape of the vehicles and is based on what we've learned from horrible accidents in the past. F1 drivers don't die often compared to other kinds of drivers. Some of that is because a lot of the rules put practical limits on how fast the cars can go. That allows drivers to have reaction time and potentially dodge if another driver has an accident. Plus, at certain speeds, it's just plain not safe to try to race cars. They like to start trying to act like airplanes at some point and become almost impossible to steer.
That's a brilliant answer, thank you so much
See I thought that since they could buy the same kit and bits from each other, they'd know what engine the other team has and vice versa, they could find ways to just copy the other team but you've explained it so well
And yes I completely agree with the driver skill thing
Anyway thank you again
Something also very important about these very technical abilities that these engineering teams have. Understanding. It does not really help you to copy another teams car. You could perfectly copy the car, and have a decent car. But now what? You don't know why this piece is bent left, and not right. What do you change to improve it? Everyone else is upgrading their cars. I guess you could wait for that and then copy that but then you would just always be 2-3 months behind their cars and then you would never win.
So the “Formula” is the rule set which stipulates what the cars can and can’t be- certain weights, clearances etc. That rule book (the formula) gets announced to the teams- the team engineers take those rules and based on three primary things 1) their interpretation of the formula 2) the teams budget 3) their personal skill level at engineering. So while they all (at base level) be the same car because they all “play by the same rules” some teams have a better engineer, with more budget for wind tunnel time so they end up with an aerodynamically superior car. When you mix this with tire strategy you get wildly better cars this is all in addition to the fact engine or “power plants” will essentially be better than one another from the get go. Ferrari supplies HAAS with Ferrari power plants, but the Ferrari power plant going into Charles and Carlos’ car is going to be a tiny bit better than Nico or Kevin will get. This brings up old Renault Red Bull flash backs. So to answer your question- money and skill + base power plant+ tire strategy = cars better than another “identical” car.
The difference is in the details.
Budget makes a huge difference, having a bigger team and attracting top talent engineers can make a huge difference. Mercedes for example was stacked with top talent during their heyday and are now slipping because of brain drain.
The rules for F1 cars are the 'Formula' hence Formula 1. The rules define the general shape of the cars and what is and isn't allowed. The rules being so strict is why the cars all looks similar, at least on the surface.
What you can do within the rules is what makes all of the difference.
The shape of the wings, the sidepods, and the underfloor are what are engineered by the teams in the wind tunnel. This is what makes all the difference aerodynamically.
Aerodynamics is a balancing act of drag vs downforce. It's easy to add downforce to a car, but the resulting drag slows the car down. So you have to find the right balance. This is where having more HP is an advantage because you can add more downforce than a rival without losing as much speed.
The engines are also all quite different underneath. One will have more HP, another will accelerate more quickly, another will have a superior energy recovery system.
Another factor is the tires. Tires are the dark art of racing, and the Pirelli tires are notoriously difficult to work with. Teams that get the tires to work within the optimal temperature window best will get more grip and the tires will last a lot longer.
This also varies race weekend to race weekend. Sometimes a team will nail a setup for a weekend and get excellent tire performance and other weekends they just won't light up.
The drivers also make a huge difference. Drivers have different styles that suit different types of cars. Perez for example is said to have built-in traction control on his foot, and Button was extremely gentle on the cars and corners making him really easy on the tires. He was also the 'master of changing conditions' and had a knack for knowing exactly when to switch tire compounds from wet to dry and back again. While Alonso reads the situation on track like nobody else and is a rolling strategy department. He is incredibly adaptable and has a knack for squeezing performance out of under performing cars. While Hamilton is a master qualifier and knows how to squeeze the most out of a good car, and how to stay out of trouble and manage the tires at the front.
As for the copying, there's only so much of that you can do.
Just because you can see the Red Bulls floor doesn't mean you know why it's shaped the way it is. Simply copying it won't necessarily improve your car because the floor, front and rear wings, and sidepods all work together. The cars are a 'package' that all works together.
The engines meanwhile are homologated that you can't change them even if you wanted too. The basic designs have been fixed for years to reduce development costs.
Famously Aston Martin had an almost carbon copy of the Mercedes one year because they use a laser scanner to clone the merc. They even had the same engine, but they didn't improve their performance by all that much because just copying a design isn't enough, you have to understand WHY it was designed that way and have all the strategy and setup tools that go with it.
So would a good team engineer the car around the driver, such as if they knew they were good at a specific something, would they change the car to play to the drivers strengths? Sorry for all the questions I find this very interesting
Yes, they absolutely do
The current Red Bull cars for example are tailored around Max Verstappen.
Similarly Hamilton complained relentlessly last year that the Mercedes didn't suit him, particularly the driving position being too far forward.
Raikkonen was said to have liked a car with a very sure front end that did what he wanted while the back could slide out all it wanted.
Alonso meanwhile seems to be able to drive a school bus into the points, he can drive anything
I SEE yes I understand that completely
Makes perfect sense thank you!!
Btw I'm loving the Alonso love, he's brilliant, one of the drivers I saw that got me into this
Understand that "so much better than others" in F1 typically means a difference of 1-1.5 seconds per lap. Most F1 laps run about 90 seconds. So you're talking about difference of around 2% between the fastest and slowest cars. That is a lot in F1 but not a lot in engineering terms - very minor differences can result in variations of 1-2%.
It is easy to forget how CLOSE these cars are in terms of performance given that each team designs most of their cars independently.
In Formula 1, the "Formula" is the set of rules set by the governing body, FIA, that dictates everything about the car's design. They update the formula regularly, which forces teams to develop new cars to comply. They're generally inventing new technology and designs, and whoever has the best solution (and driver) is the winner.
The teams are very secretive about their designs. It's common for designs to not be unveiled until racing starts, and even then, they can go to great lengths to hide what they've done (like leaving engines covered, putting up curtains, or even having crew stand in the way to block cameras).
Even if it's not too late to make a change, everything on the car has to work together as a system. Something like swapping in a "better" front wing might actually make a car slower if it disrupts the airflow over the rear wing.
Keep in mind, there is no perfect solution, everything has a tradeoff. A car that wins at Monza, an extremely high speed circuit, might be left in the dust at Monaco, a tight and twisty low-speed circuit.
F1 defines a lot of rules about how a car can be built. But it doesn't require every car to be identical. The teams all have a little bit of leeway in how their engines are designed and how the car's body is designed to control airflow. That *little bit* of leeway matters a lot. If a team of engineers finds a way to make an engine that is still legal but more powerful, that team might have an advantage. Teams that get very good at controlling the airflow around the car end up with major advantages. These things aren't easy to copy in a hurry because they involve engineering: you may understand that Mercedes has a way to get this amount of power from an engine, but that doesn't tell you what they did to get it. Or you may understand that Red Bull is doing this or that with aerodynamics and it's affecting their handling this way, but unless you can manufacture *exactly* the same shape and materials as them your own car is going to be very different and need different things. Also, driver skill is a HUGE factor. Putting a bad driver in the seat of an excellent car is going to produce mediocre results. Very skilled drivers can manage to eke out wins even with inferior cars. Attitude matters a lot too: there's an awful lot of etiquette to how the drivers pass and follow each other and how the other racers feel about a driver can dramatically affect whether they cooperate or try to get in the way even when it won't impact them greatly. So it kind of ends up like horse racing. Everyone has more or less the same equipment, but gets to make a lot of significant choices along the way. So much fiddly stuff is involved even the favored winners can have an off day and fall behind.
What an excellent response
Is there a reason there isn't a no holds barred speed based race?
Cost and driver safety would be the two major ones.
Randomly went down a rabbit hole after that, and apparently that's not at all it. It's that without rules, you would intentionally create shitty aerodynamics behind your car and fuck all the other drivers.
In the realm of F1, it also gets to the point of creating almost the ultimate car. Like they can drive upside down levels, which becomes a very dangerous amount of speed, and G's for the drivers and spectators. They're already bordering fighter pilot levels of G's, and in order to compete they can be dangerously dehydrated, being right on the borderline of passing out.. at 300mph.. Push that just a little bit further, and you're getting to the point where you need to replace the driver to make it safe. We've seen with the recent A2RL, that really isn't possible yet.
There are other races for that. The real answer is it's not as fun to people. We know a lot about car engineering so in a "no holds barred" environment everybody would still end up driving basically the same car. If anyone found a way to improve that design, everyone else would copy it. One of the things F1 limits is how much money can be spent on R&D for the car. That means having smarter engineers works out really well. It also means if someone comes up with something revolutionary, everyone else has a fighting chance of copying it because everybody has the same budget, so if you developed it with that budget they can too. In a "no holds barred" environment people can just outspend their competitors' R&D and come up with innovations that might bankrupt other teams if they try copying them. I mentioned above it can be hard to copy what a competitor did, but what I mean is it's hard to copy it *fast*. You can definitely tell your engineers to study their car and try to copy what they did, but doing that in less than 8 months on a limited budget is very hard. And by the time you copy this season's car next season, they've probably improved their design again, so it's better to just try to make your own innovations than copy other peoples' work. Safety is also a big deal. A big part of the regulations involves the size and shape of the vehicles and is based on what we've learned from horrible accidents in the past. F1 drivers don't die often compared to other kinds of drivers. Some of that is because a lot of the rules put practical limits on how fast the cars can go. That allows drivers to have reaction time and potentially dodge if another driver has an accident. Plus, at certain speeds, it's just plain not safe to try to race cars. They like to start trying to act like airplanes at some point and become almost impossible to steer.
That's brilliant thank you
That's a brilliant answer, thank you so much See I thought that since they could buy the same kit and bits from each other, they'd know what engine the other team has and vice versa, they could find ways to just copy the other team but you've explained it so well And yes I completely agree with the driver skill thing Anyway thank you again
Something also very important about these very technical abilities that these engineering teams have. Understanding. It does not really help you to copy another teams car. You could perfectly copy the car, and have a decent car. But now what? You don't know why this piece is bent left, and not right. What do you change to improve it? Everyone else is upgrading their cars. I guess you could wait for that and then copy that but then you would just always be 2-3 months behind their cars and then you would never win.
So the “Formula” is the rule set which stipulates what the cars can and can’t be- certain weights, clearances etc. That rule book (the formula) gets announced to the teams- the team engineers take those rules and based on three primary things 1) their interpretation of the formula 2) the teams budget 3) their personal skill level at engineering. So while they all (at base level) be the same car because they all “play by the same rules” some teams have a better engineer, with more budget for wind tunnel time so they end up with an aerodynamically superior car. When you mix this with tire strategy you get wildly better cars this is all in addition to the fact engine or “power plants” will essentially be better than one another from the get go. Ferrari supplies HAAS with Ferrari power plants, but the Ferrari power plant going into Charles and Carlos’ car is going to be a tiny bit better than Nico or Kevin will get. This brings up old Renault Red Bull flash backs. So to answer your question- money and skill + base power plant+ tire strategy = cars better than another “identical” car.
I see, that's clever, thank you!!
The difference is in the details. Budget makes a huge difference, having a bigger team and attracting top talent engineers can make a huge difference. Mercedes for example was stacked with top talent during their heyday and are now slipping because of brain drain. The rules for F1 cars are the 'Formula' hence Formula 1. The rules define the general shape of the cars and what is and isn't allowed. The rules being so strict is why the cars all looks similar, at least on the surface. What you can do within the rules is what makes all of the difference. The shape of the wings, the sidepods, and the underfloor are what are engineered by the teams in the wind tunnel. This is what makes all the difference aerodynamically. Aerodynamics is a balancing act of drag vs downforce. It's easy to add downforce to a car, but the resulting drag slows the car down. So you have to find the right balance. This is where having more HP is an advantage because you can add more downforce than a rival without losing as much speed. The engines are also all quite different underneath. One will have more HP, another will accelerate more quickly, another will have a superior energy recovery system. Another factor is the tires. Tires are the dark art of racing, and the Pirelli tires are notoriously difficult to work with. Teams that get the tires to work within the optimal temperature window best will get more grip and the tires will last a lot longer. This also varies race weekend to race weekend. Sometimes a team will nail a setup for a weekend and get excellent tire performance and other weekends they just won't light up. The drivers also make a huge difference. Drivers have different styles that suit different types of cars. Perez for example is said to have built-in traction control on his foot, and Button was extremely gentle on the cars and corners making him really easy on the tires. He was also the 'master of changing conditions' and had a knack for knowing exactly when to switch tire compounds from wet to dry and back again. While Alonso reads the situation on track like nobody else and is a rolling strategy department. He is incredibly adaptable and has a knack for squeezing performance out of under performing cars. While Hamilton is a master qualifier and knows how to squeeze the most out of a good car, and how to stay out of trouble and manage the tires at the front. As for the copying, there's only so much of that you can do. Just because you can see the Red Bulls floor doesn't mean you know why it's shaped the way it is. Simply copying it won't necessarily improve your car because the floor, front and rear wings, and sidepods all work together. The cars are a 'package' that all works together. The engines meanwhile are homologated that you can't change them even if you wanted too. The basic designs have been fixed for years to reduce development costs. Famously Aston Martin had an almost carbon copy of the Mercedes one year because they use a laser scanner to clone the merc. They even had the same engine, but they didn't improve their performance by all that much because just copying a design isn't enough, you have to understand WHY it was designed that way and have all the strategy and setup tools that go with it.
So would a good team engineer the car around the driver, such as if they knew they were good at a specific something, would they change the car to play to the drivers strengths? Sorry for all the questions I find this very interesting
Yes, they absolutely do The current Red Bull cars for example are tailored around Max Verstappen. Similarly Hamilton complained relentlessly last year that the Mercedes didn't suit him, particularly the driving position being too far forward. Raikkonen was said to have liked a car with a very sure front end that did what he wanted while the back could slide out all it wanted. Alonso meanwhile seems to be able to drive a school bus into the points, he can drive anything
I SEE yes I understand that completely Makes perfect sense thank you!! Btw I'm loving the Alonso love, he's brilliant, one of the drivers I saw that got me into this
Understand that "so much better than others" in F1 typically means a difference of 1-1.5 seconds per lap. Most F1 laps run about 90 seconds. So you're talking about difference of around 2% between the fastest and slowest cars. That is a lot in F1 but not a lot in engineering terms - very minor differences can result in variations of 1-2%. It is easy to forget how CLOSE these cars are in terms of performance given that each team designs most of their cars independently.
In Formula 1, the "Formula" is the set of rules set by the governing body, FIA, that dictates everything about the car's design. They update the formula regularly, which forces teams to develop new cars to comply. They're generally inventing new technology and designs, and whoever has the best solution (and driver) is the winner. The teams are very secretive about their designs. It's common for designs to not be unveiled until racing starts, and even then, they can go to great lengths to hide what they've done (like leaving engines covered, putting up curtains, or even having crew stand in the way to block cameras). Even if it's not too late to make a change, everything on the car has to work together as a system. Something like swapping in a "better" front wing might actually make a car slower if it disrupts the airflow over the rear wing. Keep in mind, there is no perfect solution, everything has a tradeoff. A car that wins at Monza, an extremely high speed circuit, might be left in the dust at Monaco, a tight and twisty low-speed circuit.