2026 Pre-Season Testing

[nitrotech]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HBiBnnLXQAA ... me=900x900

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HBiD4C2WYAA ... me=900x900

thanks, any view of the merc race sim?
actually is there a site where i can view the full sim data? (don't have an x and f1-data only shows fastest laps for me)

Merc didn't do any race sims today.

[nitrotech]

Until others fix their starts, Ferrari is going to have Renault 2003/04 kind of starts! They would jump 5 to 6 cars at the start.

[mzso]

Until others fix their starts, Ferrari is going to have Renault 2003/04 kind of starts! They would jump 5 to 6 cars at the start.

Assuming they're not on the first row to begin with.

[nitrotech]

Until others fix their starts, Ferrari is going to have Renault 2003/04 kind of starts! They would jump 5 to 6 cars at the start.

Assuming they're not on the first row to begin with.

When they know this situation, they don't have to make setup compromise like usually it's done by achieving a setup that helps in quali and then in race. They can simply create a setup for race and qualify with it and not bother if it's 2nd row or 3rd.

[Seanspeed]

I'm pretty confident Mercedes-powered cars will magically start much better on actual raceday.

[AR3-GP]

Qualifying will be very confusing to follow. Sector times will be useless. Driver could be 4 tenths off in S1, and still take pole just because they delayed the energy usage later in the lap.

[FittingMechanics]

Qualifying will be very confusing to follow. Sector times will be useless. Driver could be 4 tenths off in S1, and still take pole just because they delayed the energy usage later in the lap.

We'll learn soon who is good where.

[AR3-GP]

Qualifying will be very confusing to follow. Sector times will be useless. Driver could be 4 tenths off in S1, and still take pole just because they delayed the energy usage later in the lap.

We'll learn soon who is good where.

Not necessarily. Teams might even adapt to one another in real time. So driver could also change the deployment between qualifying runs and then they'll show yellow sectors where they stopped using energy. Drivers could show as many as two yellow sectors and then still put it on pole. Another driver can put in two purple sectors and then finish 1 second off without making any errors in the final sector. This is what I feared. A driver could run perfect lines and be far off just because of energy deployment.

The commentators will struggle to adapt to this. You will never know who is on a good lap since slightly different deployment will cause yellows. The traditional lap time build-up that we know from the previous-gen PU is gone because the lap time is so sensitive to the energy deployment.

[Artur Craft]

I'm pretty confident Mercedes-powered cars will magically start much better on actual raceday.

Yeah, don´t get too happy about your beloved Ferrari. They can even start much better but Mclaren, Mercedes and RB are faster

Oh goodness, how naive Aston Martin was about Honda On the other hand, RB was very smart to get rid of them right on time

[upsidedowntoast]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HBiBnnLXQAA ... me=900x900

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HBiD4C2WYAA ... me=900x900

thanks, any view of the merc race sim?
actually is there a site where i can view the full sim data? (don't have an x and f1-data only shows fastest laps for me)

Merc didn't do any race sims today.

what were they doing then? because both George and Kimi put in a mega amount of laps.

data collection and quali sims?

sorry for the dumb questions, I'm asleep during all the testing so I'm trying to catch up

[Seanspeed]

thanks, any view of the merc race sim?
actually is there a site where i can view the full sim data? (don't have an x and f1-data only shows fastest laps for me)

Merc didn't do any race sims today.

what were they doing then? because both George and Kimi put in a mega amount of laps.

data collection and quali sims?

sorry for the dumb questions, I'm asleep during all the testing so I'm trying to catch up

For a portion of the day, they had a similar program as yesterday where they'd do a fast lap, then come in, stay on those tires and then do like a 10-12 lap stint, then repeat the process. I'm guessing a lot of setup work.

[catent]

I'm pretty confident Mercedes-powered cars will magically start much better on actual raceday.

Yeah, don´t get too happy about your beloved Ferrari. They can even start much better but Mclaren, Mercedes and RB are faster

Oh goodness, how naive Aston Martin was about Honda On the other hand, RB was very smart to get rid of them right on time

You are certain that McLaren, Mercedes, and Red Bull are faster than Ferrari based exclusively on incomplete preseason testing?

What do you mean by "faster", exactly? Single-lap pace? Race pace/tire management?

[Artur Craft]

I´m confident on my guess but it is just that, a guess, obviously. What I do know almost certainly is that AM is in serious trouble and that ain´t changing any time soon.

[upsidedowntoast]

Merc didn't do any race sims today.

what were they doing then? because both George and Kimi put in a mega amount of laps.

data collection and quali sims?

sorry for the dumb questions, I'm asleep during all the testing so I'm trying to catch up

For a portion of the day, they had a similar program as yesterday where they'd do a fast lap, then come in, stay on those tires and then do like a 10-12 lap stint, then repeat the process. I'm guessing a lot of setup work.

gotcha, thanks much! In that case does anyone have the stint data for george?

[Cassius]

Qualifying will be very confusing to follow. Sector times will be useless. Driver could be 4 tenths off in S1, and still take pole just because they delayed the energy usage later in the lap.

We'll learn soon who is good where.

Not necessarily. Teams might even adapt to one another in real time. So driver could also change the deployment between qualifying runs and then they'll show yellow sectors where they stopped using energy. Drivers could show as many as two yellow sectors and then still put it on pole. Another driver can put in two purple sectors and then finish 1 second off without making any errors in the final sector. This is what I feared. A driver could run perfect lines and be far off just because of energy deployment.

The commentators will struggle to adapt to this. You will never know who is on a good lap since slightly different deployment will cause yellows. The traditional lap time build-up that we know from the previous-gen PU is gone because the lap time is so sensitive to the energy deployment.

Fully agree. As an example, in the first quali sims today Max seemed very slow in s2 as we have seen last week as well. Then suddenly he changed deployment settings, and he didn't improve in s1 anymore, but did in s2. This was not just tyre, setup or fuel related.