2023 Oracle Red Bull Racing F1 Team

[AR3-GP]

Interesting comments by peter windsor who spoke to Peter windsor before the race:

13:50 Peter WIndsor was talking to Newey before the race and asked about the TD, Newey said 100% no. It was just a perfect storm of everything going wrong and mentioned that the humidity and ambiance might have had an effect on the upshifts (engine) as well..

Adrian said the shifting issues could have been caused by the humidity. Very interesting.

Could be one more reason why RBs were nowhere on straights all weekend. I'm more and more hopeful japan will be back to normal. McLaren might be dangerous mind you. New update supposedly 4 tenths worth and they were already proper good in medium and high speed corner.

Hard to judge with mercs stuck. Im sure hamilton had loads of pace left, he usually does.

I meant before they caught the Mclaren and the Ferrari. You can see they are suffering from tire deg because they are running flat out. It's very similar to the final stint for Perez and Verstapen in Baku where they also ran flat out and tires degraded early. When you push flat out, you kill the tires. It shows how much Verstappen is still lapping within the car because he's getting quicker all the way to the end, unlike the Mercs before they caught the leaders.

https://i.postimg.cc/nc4LPy5s/image.png

https://i.postimg.cc/d0mmQNLD/image.png

I see where you're coming from and you might be right in russell's case, but hamilton had more in hand certainly. You can even see it on lap 56 when he finally gets a second of clear air after passing leclerc and puts in 36.4 - faster than any verstappen's lap. Actually all hamilton's laps in clear air are faster than all verstappen's laps in clear air.
Verstappen was pushing 110% after passing gasly, you don't often see car moving around like that.

Sure I don't think Max had the fastest car here, Hamilton probably quicker than anyone, but seeing Verstappen knocking off the mid 36s with consistency and no tire deg to the vest last lap resembles the better qualities of the RB19 that we are familiar with. That stint was a far cry from Brazil last year.

[Juzh]

Well I watched both Ver and Hams medium stint from onboard cam, and it's immediately obvious how much more stable mercedes was this race. It is planted on entry and exit, very little corrections required, can ride all kerbs with ease and doesn't get unsettled. Meanwhile RB is like riding a bull, loose on entry and exit, skittish everywhere, cant touch any kerb, constant corrections... Hamilton did manage to cook his tyres around 5 laps before the end, then he started losing the rear big time, but it was easily controlled slides, unlike sudden snaps on RB.

agreed on the brazil observation. At least deg was fine if nothing else

[organic]

13:50 Peter WIndsor was talking to Newey before the race and asked about the TD, Newey said 100% no. It was just a perfect storm of everything going wrong and mentioned that the humidity and ambiance might have had an effect on the upshifts (engine) as well..

[AR3-GP]

This kind of car behavior was present in Canada.

Also, this isn’t the first time that Rb had issues with controlling the PU in humid conditions.

[organic]

This kind of car behavior was present in Canada.

Also, this isn’t the first time that Rb had issues with controlling the PU in humid conditions.

Yes it was. Canada was a very lucky win in hindsight. People discounted the struggle at the time. Max talking about how it's something they're working on for next year already said Singapore was going to be bad. Not something they can remedy with setup.

Hopefully the rest of calendar won't present this combination of characteristics. But I can see one or two of the rest being a problem

What are the other examples of them struggling with shifts/PU in humid weather? Is turkey 2020 one

[CHT]

With the record-winning streak coming to an end, this will help relieve pressure on the drivers to update their Wikipedia so the entire team can start focusing on 2024 championship.

I was wondering if Max did not pit in lap 41 for medium and was lucky to catch the SC in lap 43 or 44, will there be any chance of him winning the race?

[Bill]

This kind of car behavior was present in Canada.

Also, this isn’t the first time that Rb had issues with controlling the PU in humid conditions.

Yes it was. Canada was a very lucky win in hindsight. People discounted the struggle at the time. Max talking about how it's something they're working on for next year already said Singapore was going to be bad. Not something they can remedy with setup.

Hopefully the rest of calendar won't present this combination of characteristics. But I can see one or two of the rest being a problem

What are the other examples of them struggling with shifts/PU in humid weather? Is turkey 2020 one

the car had no front end ,no grip ,no traction the things you need in street circuit the pu thing had no bearing on sunday perfomance.the were better on medium tires because those has more grip

[basti313]

With the record-winning streak coming to an end, this will help relieve pressure on the drivers to update their Wikipedia so the entire team can start focusing on 2024 championship.

I was wondering if Max did not pit in lap 41 for medium and was lucky to catch the SC in lap 43 or 44, will there be any chance of him winning the race?

Not really, he was still slower than the Mercs. With staying out he would have lost 10-13sec on Leclerc (not sure if I am perfectly calculating the gain after the stop of around 3sec). So the 15sec shorter pitstop would not have helped a lot.
In the end with stopping under the safety car he would most probably have caught Leclerc due to two? less overtakes.

[CHT]

With the record-winning streak coming to an end, this will help relieve pressure on the drivers to update their Wikipedia so the entire team can start focusing on 2024 championship.

I was wondering if Max did not pit in lap 41 for medium and was lucky to catch the SC in lap 43 or 44, will there be any chance of him winning the race?

Not really, he was still slower than the Mercs. With staying out he would have lost 10-13sec on Leclerc (not sure if I am perfectly calculating the gain after the stop of around 3sec). So the 15sec shorter pitstop would not have helped a lot.
In the end with stopping under the safety car he would most probably have caught Leclerc due to two? less overtakes.

Didnt manage to study the lap times, I presume you are saying when Max running on medium he is still slower than Merc on medium. Is that correct?

If Max was able to catch the safety car, he would still be 1 stop H/M without losing track position due to SC. not sure if thats possible?

[Wouter]

...

[rbirules]

With the record-winning streak coming to an end, this will help relieve pressure on the drivers to update their Wikipedia so the entire team can start focusing on 2024 championship.

I was wondering if Max did not pit in lap 41 for medium and was lucky to catch the SC in lap 43 or 44, will there be any chance of him winning the race?

I think there were two (long shot) possibilities of Max winning:
1. There isn't a SC/VSC until lap 30-40, rewarding RB's inverted tire strategy, allowing them to gain 15 seconds on the rest of the field via pitting under those conditions instead of normal racing conditions.

This option was obviously ruined when a SC came out at the perfect time for those who started on medium or soft tires.

2. Could RB have switched Max (and just Max) to a two stop strategy when the SC came out?

He was running in 8th at the time (just behind Alonso and Ocon). If he pitted like everybody else he would have held that position (dropping to 9th if Checo stayed out, he would have been in 3rd). Then all the cars would be bunched up, but Max would be on new mediums compared to new hards (and Checo on 20 lap old hards). How high could Max have gotten with that tire advantage? I honestly don't know if the advantage was enough to pass cars on new hards. I think he probably would have gotten past Alonso and Ocon, especially with Checo holding them up. Leclerc was nursing an engine issue (per Mark Hughes' race recap) so he could probably get by him. Could he have caught and passed Lewis or Lando?

Max would have been able to be more aggressive knowing he was going to stop again, while others were conserving tires for a one stop strategy. Max was 8 seconds behind Leclerc when he pitted on lap 40. The top 5 had about one second gaps between each car. This is what makes me think Max could have gotten into the top 5 on that stint on mediums.

Then the VSC came at the perfect time for him to switch to new soft tires (had a set because he didn't make it to Q3). Lewis was in P4 when he pitted under VSC and he only lost position to Charles. So that's worst case for Max as well, in my opinion (whatever position he was in prior to pitting again, he would be in that position plus one spot lost to Charles, unless he was able to make it all the way to 1st and build a 15+ second lead in 22 laps on mediums). How fast would Max have been at the end with fresh soft tires compared to the Mercedes cars on fresh mediums and the leaders on old hard tires?

Would he have been able to catch and pass either Mercedes before they caught up to the Norris-Sainz train? Would he have been ahead of Lewis before that final stint began? I don't know these answers, but if anybody does it's probably some of the very smart posters on this forum. But this is the only long shot strategy that I could have seen allowing Max to win (he would have been on the faster compound than Mercedes for the last 42 laps of the race, and much faster compound than Norris and the Ferraris). Maybe it's not plausible at all (even within the long shot realm of possibilities).

I don't really understand the decision (with a bit of hindsight) to not pit him under SC. He would have to pit again (most likely not able to make mediums last until the end) but he had to do that anyway staying out. (But being on new mediums probably allows you to wait out a SC/VSC longer than 20 lap old hard tires.) He gained six positions staying out, but quickly lost four of them and then the RBs were running 6-7, after being 2-4 at the restart, and losing time to the leaders, who weren't exactly pushing. Maybe RB thought the 20 lap old hards would heat up quicker than did and that they'd be able to hold position, to me that's the only reasoning that makes the decision to stay out logical. I guess another SC could have happened in 10 more laps (around lap 30-35), that would have been before the gap to the leaders got too big, but then they would still lose a lot of track position just like they did when they pitted. It's hard not to be blinded by hindsight when you know the SC/VSC occured at the perfect times for a two stop strategy and Max/Checo were the only top cars with a set of new softs.

[Wouter]

RBR members in Tokyo today.





Helmut Marko was at an AlphaTauri event in Tokyo.

[basti313]

With the record-winning streak coming to an end, this will help relieve pressure on the drivers to update their Wikipedia so the entire team can start focusing on 2024 championship.

I was wondering if Max did not pit in lap 41 for medium and was lucky to catch the SC in lap 43 or 44, will there be any chance of him winning the race?

Not really, he was still slower than the Mercs. With staying out he would have lost 10-13sec on Leclerc (not sure if I am perfectly calculating the gain after the stop of around 3sec). So the 15sec shorter pitstop would not have helped a lot.
In the end with stopping under the safety car he would most probably have caught Leclerc due to two? less overtakes.

Didnt manage to study the lap times, I presume you are saying when Max running on medium he is still slower than Merc on medium. Is that correct?

If Max was able to catch the safety car, he would still be 1 stop H/M without losing track position due to SC. not sure if thats possible?

Yes, slower than the Merc.
As said....he was loosing time to Leclerc. If he stayed out to "catch" the VSC, he would have lost a lot of time.

Interesting approach by rbirules.
In hindsight it would have been possible to switch to a 2 stop and pit for Mediums on the first SC. But this stunt would have only worked with a perfectly timed SC as we saw it...and he would have been stuck behind Ocon. So I think as he most probably would not have passed Ocon on similarly old tires, this would have ended even worse.

[rbirules]

Interesting approach by rbirules.
In hindsight it would have been possible to switch to a 2 stop and pit for Mediums on the first SC. But this stunt would have only worked with a perfectly timed SC as we saw it...and he would have been stuck behind Ocon. So I think as he most probably would not have passed Ocon on similarly old tires, this would have ended even worse.

Yeah, that's the variable I didn't know, or still don't know, when I was thinking about this alternate strategy. On a safety car restart (lap 22 or whenever it was), would Max on new mediums be able to get past Ocon? . . . and then Alonso? Perez was next up (and he kept Alonso and Ocon behind on worn hards, until he pitted on lap 39) and he would have let Max through.

Maybe the difference in pace between the various compounds wasn't enough to allow Max to pass on track (other than cars like Haas, which he passed on a slower compound tire at the beginning of the race). Hard to say since we never really saw two different compounds at the same time and same age on the track (Zhou was the only driver that pitted for mediums at the first SC and he went to the end on them).

Max passed a few cars early in the race (while on hard tires), moving up from 11th to 8th; Russell, Norris, Hamilton, and Leclerc passed the RBs right after the SC restart on much fresher tires; Max moved up from 15th to 6th on new medium tires (a few of those cars pitted I believe); and of course both Mercedes passed Leclerc on new(er) mediums compared to old hards late in the race. That's most of the on track passing that took place (other than fights in the middle or back of the pack).

[basti313]

Yes, there was not much overtaking with those DRS trains. And I just checked the numbers...Ocon was 90% of his race in DRS of Alonso. No way to overtake him no matter which tires as the Alpine had a good straight line speed. The only way to pass these two was to stay out at the first SC, so this was the only right choice.