2021 Russian Grand Prix - Sochi, Sep 24 - 26

[_cerber1]

Been talking with Fábrega, he said it could be possible later, not at the hour programmed.

It will be dark in Sochi at 18:15, possibly even earlier due to bad weather.

[Mansell89]

Are we looking like we will start the session on time as it stands or are they waiting to anticipate the 15 minute shower (downpour) that they’re expecting?

[search]

can't see why they shouldn't start on time. Could be a bit chaotic with everyone trying to get a lap in early, though.

[El Scorchio]

They’ve just said on Sky that if Verstappen finishes ahead of Leclerc in qualifying, that he starts 19th. That can’t be right, can it?

I thought the 3 places is applied AFTER all engine penalties are applied?

[search]

I thought the 3 places is applied AFTER all engine penalties are applied?

I think before, going by the rules. But they are not 100% clear.

"c) Once the grid has been established [...] grid position penalties will be applied to the drivers in question in the order the offences were committed.

d) Any driver required to start the race from the back of the grid [...] will be arranged on the grid behind any driver penalised under c) above. If more than one driver is required to start the race from the back of the grid they will be arranged in qualifying order."

So I'd say VER gets his +3 first, and if he is still ahead of Leclerc then, he also starts in front of him.

[El Scorchio]

I thought the 3 places is applied AFTER all engine penalties are applied?

I think before, going by the rules. But they are not 100% clear.

"c) Once the grid has been established [...] grid position penalties will be applied to the drivers in question in the order the offences were committed.

d) Any driver required to start the race from the back of the grid [...] will be arranged on the grid behind any driver penalised under c) above. If more than one driver is required to start the race from the back of the grid they will be arranged in qualifying order."

So I'd say VER gets his +3 first, and if he is still ahead of Leclerc then, he also starts in front of him.

Yup- they just clarified that actually. Interesting. I’d have thought it would make more sense the other way round, but I guess this is a fairly unique situation. I wonder if they’ll tweak it going forward.

[El Scorchio]

Lots of spray on parts of the track. Looks like one end of the main straight is dry and the other end is wet!

[godlameroso]

I can think of 3 reasons for doing more than 2 stops: desperation, trying to steal the fastest lap, or getting a 'free stop' during a Safety Car period. You'd likely require a combination of these factors to facilitate 3 stops.

This track has a pitlane speed limit of 60kph. Between that and the low degradation tarmac, pit stops are hugely disincentivized, as evidenced by every race ever held here.

Look at the data from Practice 1, where the tyres typically degrade at their worst.

Bottas (C3) - 9 lap stint
01:41.762
01:40.801
01:41.978
01:40.761
01:40.675
01:41.172
01:40.232
01:40.615
01:40.516
Average: 01:40.946; 01:40.682 if excluding the initial high 01:41's.

I.e. Degradation lower than the fuel burn-off effect.

The Mercs are going to be under little to no threat with Max at the back of the field. They'll try to get through to Q3 on the C4 (yellow), nurse those tyres for as long as required during the race, before pitting for C3 (white). Then, come race end, they'll bolt on some C5's for the fastest lap. A 'fake' 2-stop in other words.

All of this assuming a dry race without Safety Cars.

That's 9 laps...The race is around 6 times longer than that, the tires are going to fall off a cliff and be horrendous to drive on in ~20 laps, there will be almost no grip in the rear, maybe you can nurse them for a one stop, but you'll be so painfully slow that it's not worth it.

So an, as yet, unobserved, yet humongous drop off in tyre performance. Okay then.

I'll stick with my prediction of a '1-stop' for Mercedes, with an unneccesary 2nd stop for fastest lap at the end of the race.

The drop off means if the opening stint starts in mid 40's on C2, then by lap 15 only mid 41's will be possible because you won't be able to put down the power in sector 3, by lap 20 you'll be doing 42's and you still have 32 laps to go. If you box on lap 14 you'll be doing mid 39's to high 38's because of fuel burnoff, and fresh tires, that's like 2.5 seconds pace difference per lap. Enough to overtake cars on older tires. Say I severely miscalculated, the hards are still not going to be able to do 30 laps for the same aforementioned reason. The pace drop off and the power of the undercut is too strong.

A 2.5 second per lap pace disparity means it takes ~10 laps to make up a pitstop loss. If your final stint is 14 laps, that gives you enough time to catch up, and gives you ~3 laps to get the overtake done.

[godlameroso]

Who is going to try dry tires?

[El Scorchio]

I don’t really understand why LeClerc has bothered to go through to q2.

[El Scorchio]

Also love MSC jr’s ’beep beep beep’ just now. Nice to see a driver with a sense of humour and not just launching a tirade of swear words.

[godlameroso]

Wants to make sure the power unit is working as intended? Honda isn't bringing anything new, so makes sense to save wear for the race and the rest of the season.

[godlameroso]

Can I just say I'm impressed by Latifi's progress this year, maybe a strong teammate like Russell was what he needed to step his own game up.

[langedweil]

Can I just say I'm impressed by Latifi's progress this year, maybe a strong teammate like Russell was what he needed to step his own game up.

Yes .. he most certainly puts in very decent drives lately !

[RZS10]

Also nice that Williams saw the improvement and retained him as their driver.

Btw ... i checked and they changed it to qualifying order with multiple end of grid penalties for 2019, see page 29/71 35.2 d), before that it was just who left the pits first with a new engine in the back.

Will we see dry tyres in Q3? Yep ... Russell.