Marti_EF3 wrote: ↑10 Oct 2020, 16:14
Worst sector is S3, where Merc have a clear advantage. Start will be key, if not, I think beating Merc is almost impossible
It's all in the final turn, it's the one corner type the RB is weak on, there's no camber to help you, and the speed range of the entry is one the car has never liked since the start of the season. Luckily that situation improves on heavy fuel, and tyres are still a big unknown. I think it's close enough that a well timed pitstop could drastically change things, the top 3 have a nice gap to the rest that I feel first order of business would be to pull a gap to come out in clean air after the pit stop. I feel that no one will want to blink first and everyone will try to prolong the first stint to have some tire life left over.
We don't have a lot of tyre information so we don't know if the wear rates on the soft or medium will be very different, what is apparent is that the soft is much faster than the medium, the hard may be too difficult to use in this weather unless the team prepared for that in their parc ferme setup. The fronts grain, the rears are heavily loaded so they wear normally. I hope that the front wing tweaks don't hold us up in the pits for too long.
Also there's a chance of a safety car on the start, that first corner is quite treacherous and cannot fit many cars side by side, so always a chance to get rear ended or side swiped.