2026 Pre-Season Testing

[FittingMechanics]

A cluster f*** at the start would be interesting but it is not good racing.

Max had a hard time overtaking Bottas in his Cadillac in attack mode today. It took 2 tries.

https://x.com/MV33Racing/status/2024594 ... 35588?s=20

(the tweet is wrong in that it says "they promised us better overtaking". No they didn't. Their only goal was to make an F1 car that could function with these power units. And they barely accomplished that. Overtaking or following was not a priority at all. They just gave it some lip service and thats it.)

My point was that cars having different strengths would make racing more interesting.

What is wrong with that Hadjar overtake? Perfectly fine.

You could see on Thursday Hamilton catch Piastri and try and overtake, he was able to be very close in corners and drive alongside on the straights, took him half a lap to make the move. Looked good. I do think laptime difference at that moment was 1-2s so maybe not perfect match for what races will be but it looked much better than DRS flybys. Here is a link https://streamain.com/en/XarZscgoFKJG9Kj/watch

What is wrong with the overtake is that it is one of the top cars in the field with one of the bottom cars in the field. If a top 3 car can barely pass a bottom 3 car, then what does that say about how much passing is going to happen in the top 10 ? Or the bottom 10 ?

Thanks to the flat floor, it will most likely result in just gaps. There won't be DRS trains because everyone will be gapped out. There was no such thing as DRS trains in the non venturi era. Because everyone just gapped out.

Was Hadjar on same amount of fuel and tire age as Cadillac? You have no idea.

[timorous]

I wonder if the turbo lag situation which seems to be presenting as quite a delta at starts will also be present in the pit lane. I can't imagine drivers will be revving the engine while they are stopped and getting the tyres changed because that rocks the car making the change slower. Pit stop pull aways could be quite different between teams as well.

[FittingMechanics]

I've seen it happening again. Drivers don't go full throttle out of the last corner when starting a hot lap. They want to charge the battery to have 4MJ crossing the start/finish line. That means they have 4MJ + 9.5MJ maximum to use on the lap. If they go full throttle out of the last corner, they'll have much less energy to use on the next lap.

It is a followup on this post: viewtopic.php?p=1326589#p1326589

I think you are mistaken here. You can use 8.5 MJ per lap - no matter how much you have at start of lap. So if you start at 4 MJ you don't need to recharge 8.5 MJ till the end of lap, you can recharge just 4.5 MJ to reach maximun for lap.

They have done this "full throttle close to the start line" for the whole Bahrain test. I think they do it because these cars reach terminal velocity very quickly and then lose speed, so if you use your energy early on the straight you have lower speed at the end of the straight.

[SoulPancake13]

I got LEC doing an average stint of 38.06 with an extra stop compared to Piastri who had an average of 38.5. That gap over a race distance is basically a pit stop worth of difference, so relatively equal time for the entire race. Leclerc did his race sim in 45C, so I'd say Ferrari pretty clearly a step ahead of McLaren

[AR3-GP]

I've seen it happening again. Drivers don't go full throttle out of the last corner when starting a hot lap. They want to charge the battery to have 4MJ crossing the start/finish line. That means they have 4MJ + 9.5MJ maximum to use on the lap. If they go full throttle out of the last corner, they'll have much less energy to use on the next lap.

It is a followup on this post: viewtopic.php?p=1326589#p1326589

I think you are mistaken here. You can use 8.5 MJ per lap - no matter how much you have at start of lap. So if you start at 4 MJ you don't need to recharge 8.5 MJ till the end of lap, you can recharge just 4.5 MJ to reach maximun for lap.

They have done this "full throttle close to the start line" for the whole Bahrain test. I think they do it because these cars reach terminal velocity very quickly and then lose speed, so if you use your energy early on the straight you have lower speed at the end of the straight.

That's not correct. 8.5MJ is the recovery limit. It's exactly as I explained including the reasoning. You want to have the 4MJ battery and then recover 8.5MJ in the lap for a total of 12.5MJ deployment. If you gun it out of last corner, you have only around 9MJ of deployment in your hot lap. It's one of the perversities of the new regs.

[AR3-GP]

I got LEC doing an average stint of 38.06 with an extra stop compared to Piastri who had an average of 38.5. That gap over a race distance is basically a pit stop worth of difference, so relatively equal time for the entire race. Leclerc did his race sim in 45C, so I'd say Ferrari pretty clearly a step ahead of McLaren

1 stoppers are dead with all this MGU-K torque. I believe most races will be 2 and 3 stoppers.

[FittingMechanics]

I've seen it happening again. Drivers don't go full throttle out of the last corner when starting a hot lap. They want to charge the battery to have 4MJ crossing the start/finish line. That means they have 4MJ + 9.5MJ maximum to use on the lap. If they go full throttle out of the last corner, they'll have much less energy to use on the next lap.

It is a followup on this post: viewtopic.php?p=1326589#p1326589

I think you are mistaken here. You can use 8.5 MJ per lap - no matter how much you have at start of lap. So if you start at 4 MJ you don't need to recharge 8.5 MJ till the end of lap, you can recharge just 4.5 MJ to reach maximun for lap.

They have done this "full throttle close to the start line" for the whole Bahrain test. I think they do it because these cars reach terminal velocity very quickly and then lose speed, so if you use your energy early on the straight you have lower speed at the end of the straight.

That's not correct. 8.5MJ is the recovery limit. It's exactly as I explained including the reasoning. You want to have the 4MJ battery and then recover 8.5MJ in the lap for a total of 12.5MJ deployment. If you gun it out of last corner, you have only around 9MJ of deployment in your hot lap. It's one of the perversities of the new regs.

https://i.postimg.cc/XJWDJc64/image.png

Wow, didn't realize that. I thought that 8.5 MJ is discharge limit because I heard drivers that recharging is less of a problem on a quali lap so figured it has to be because they start the lap full and finish empty. I guess that it's some other reason.

So on a qualy lap they can use 350 kW for about 15-16 seconds if they can recharge.

Btw in the morning Anthony Davidson was explaining that you can super clip only if your battery is empty, wasn't aware this.was in the rules? Does anyone know?

He also said they are talking about increasing super clip from 250kW to 350kW.

[ChrisF1]

I think that FIA if dangerous situations occurs because of clipping needs to re introduce the MGU H. All the providers except Audi have them in stock so it would be a minor job to bolt it on. Audi could buy it from one of the other providers...........

F1 cars aren't made of Legos.

This is a technical forum and people use "Legos". All hope is lost.

[motobaleno]

few moments ago sky Italia F1 reported that there is presently an active discussion to limit electric deploy to 250kw or 200kw...in order to limit "weird" harvesting procedures...they are saying that this morning several cars have actively tested these new configurations...both 250 and 200...and that there is a real possibility to start in Australia with a new limit...to me all this stuff seems lunar...

[BorisTheBlade]

Btw in the morning Anthony Davidson was explaining that you can super clip only if your battery is empty, wasn't aware this.was in the rules? Does anyone know?

He also said they are talking about increasing super clip from 250kW to 350kW.

The first phrase from AD is definitely not in the regulations. You can super-clip whenever you want after you followed the downward slope of reducing the ERS-K deployment as specified in the rules. Maybe with "empty" he meant "not completely full", which would make this a "Captain Obvious" statement.

The second one I heard as well. I already found the limit of 250 kW a bit arbitrary, although 350 kW would only leave around 50 kW as power to the wheels, which is about 1/3 of what my VW ID.3 is able to deploy under full-throttle

[FittingMechanics]

Btw in the morning Anthony Davidson was explaining that you can super clip only if your battery is empty, wasn't aware this.was in the rules? Does anyone know?

He also said they are talking about increasing super clip from 250kW to 350kW.

The first phrase from AD is definitely not in the regulations. You can super-clip whenever you want after you followed the downward slope of reducing the ERS-K deployment as specified in the rules. Maybe with "empty" he meant "not completely full", which would make this a "Captain Obvious" statement.

The second one I heard as well. I already found the limit of 250 kW a bit arbitrary, although 350 kW would only leave around 50 kW as power to the wheels, which is about 1/3 of what my VW ID.3 is able to deploy under full-throttle

I went back and rewatched it, he said "You can only super clip once you've reached zero deployment" - About 7:58 mark. That is in line with what you said.
https://f1tv.formula1.com/detail/100001 ... ction=play

Rampdown in electrical power cannot be very quick so you have to start in advance, reach 0 kW from MGU-K and then you can superclip. You don't have to have an empty battery.

The idea that superclip is dangerous but lift and coast (with MGU-K acting as a 350 kW brake) is quite strange.

Superclip at 250 kW means you have net positive of 100 kW - you will start to slow down but not that much.
Lift and MGU-K brake will slow you down at 350 kW.

Superclip at 350 kW would mean you have about 0 net kW - kind of like normal lift and coast where you don't harvest.

[FrukostScones]

for whom who does not have visuals:

[FrukostScones]

few moments ago sky Italia F1 reported that there is presently an active discussion to limit electric deploy to 250kw or 200kw...in order to limit "weird" harvesting procedures...they are saying that this morning several cars have actively tested these new configurations...both 250 and 200...and that there is a real possibility to start in Australia with a new limit...to me all this stuff seems lunar...

Auto Motor Und Sport had also an article about this... incomprehensible!

[johnnycesup]

few moments ago sky Italia F1 reported that there is presently an active discussion to limit electric deploy to 250kw or 200kw...in order to limit "weird" harvesting procedures...they are saying that this morning several cars have actively tested these new configurations...both 250 and 200...and that there is a real possibility to start in Australia with a new limit...to me all this stuff seems lunar...

Auto Motor Und Sport had also an article about this... incomprehensible!

The only explanation I can think of for this is that the overtake mode is completely useless, and they think it could work if instead of more power at the middle of the straight the car behind gets 100-150 kW extra right at the beginning.

[FittingMechanics]

few moments ago sky Italia F1 reported that there is presently an active discussion to limit electric deploy to 250kw or 200kw...in order to limit "weird" harvesting procedures...they are saying that this morning several cars have actively tested these new configurations...both 250 and 200...and that there is a real possibility to start in Australia with a new limit...to me all this stuff seems lunar...

Auto Motor Und Sport had also an article about this... incomprehensible!

The only explanation I can think of for this is that the overtake mode is completely useless, and they think it could work if instead of more power at the middle of the straight the car behind gets 100-150 kW extra right at the beginning.

Davidson was saying they will test a 350 kW superclip (right now limited to 250 kW). I think they are just exploring various options to tweak the format.

Increasing superclip to 350 kW would make it easier to fill the battery in tracks like Monza.