Formula One expert Mark Hughes, who currently is a Grand Prix editor for Motor Sport magazine and has had several F1-related books published, comments on the 2019 Formula One season and the first impressions after the testing session which took place this week at the Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona:
“When we strip away the tyre offsets, the competitive picture appears to tally very closely with what the teams themselves were reporting – the headline news of which is that Ferrari’s new SF90 hit the ground running as a rocketship, beautifully poised, consistent and reliable. Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc were both delighted with the car, Vettel describing it as the best pre-season test he’s ever experienced.
Out on track, it looked as though it allowed them all sorts of liberties with Leclerc in particular often to be found experimenting with how late he could brake, how much kerb he could get away with. It was noticeable how much earlier than anyone else they get on the power, feeling the stability and going with it.
In this way it was joining up the acceleration stretches between, say, the exit of Turn 1 and the beginning of Turn 2, visibly better than anything else. Vettel and Leclerc shared the car on each of the four days and were generally extremely evenly matched for pace – at around 0.4sec clear of the field when account was made for the tyre offsets. Now, we do not definitively know if this was set with equivalent fuel loads to the following Red Bulls and Mercs. But it would be unusual if it wasn’t. The typical programme for the teams given the beautifully clear track conditions they enjoyed would be initial aero correlation tests (as seen by the various bits of metalwork hanging off cars around the sidepods and wings), followed by a steadily increasing sequence of laps with a reference fuel load and the comparison of various components.
Full-on race simulations, with full race durations and ‘live’ pitstops are usually only attempted in the second week. Likewise full qualifying, low-fuel simulations. There was no evidence of either in this first week. So what we had were a series of multiple lap runs, enough to see the patterns – and with no reason to suppose that anyone would be running an order of magnitude different fuel load to anyone else.
Given all the above, here’s approximately how it looked if we correct all the times to the hardest tyre used (the C3).
C3).
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Position | Team | Lap time |
---|---|---|
1 | Ferrari | 1min 17.4sec |
2= | Red Bull and Mercedes | 1min 17.8sec |
4= | Renault and Alfa Romeo | 1min 18.5sec |
6 | McLaren | 1min 18.6sec |
7 | Toro Rosso | 1min 18.8sec |
8 | Haas | 1min 19.1sec |
9 | Racing Point | 1min 19.7sec |
10 | Williams | 1min 21.5sec |
Unsurprisingly, it would appear we have the same elite group of top three teams as in the last few seasons. Within that group Mercedes was never entirely happy with the balance of the new W10 and it was visible that it was keeping its drivers busier than the Ferrari. Two different versions of front suspension were tried but neither gave the car the balance Hamilton and Bottas sought. However, it would be no surprise to see a much-improved car next week after the boffins have analysed the results of this week.”
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