The element of luck - does bad luck exist in racing?

[marcush.]

how often did we hear this -I happened to have bad set of tyres, we were unlucky with the second stop and a wheelgun failed and what have you .
In racing it seems to be till todays a serious explanation for failure even when even the most random observer does scratch his head how such an accumulation ofluck or the lack of it can possibly occur.
Mind you hundreds of people work flat out developping cutting edge machinery 365 days a year to campaign 2cars every other week ....
Compare this with automotive zero defect in field approach or aerospace and you have to think twice how much in terms of "luck" is involved in engineering.
Luck is a synome for taking a bet or gambling on something which carries a big risk....which in itself is calculable if you know or understand what you are doing.
certainly the teams this year do not really understand the car-tyre-road interface under all conditions and the tools they have in hand does not enable them to predict reliably what will happen in the course of a weekend.

Again and again some driver reaches a unbelievable patch of good or bad luck.Schumacher an example of both extremes in his career .But is this really luck or just the result of everything in perfect harmony or in other extremes one or more key incredients missing in the equation causing a pile up of bad things happening ..

I certainly do not believe in the element of luck ,I realise there are calculated risks but there just has to be an explanation when things go wrong in every posssible situation .

so engineers around who would underwrite the thesis of rough patches do exist even with the most proffessional approaches in a competitive environment .Or is it more like -you have erred on the wrong side weighing up risks and have to pay a price
in doing so.

[xpensive]

Indeed, there's basically no such thing as luck whatsoever, at least not in engineering terms. There is however stochastic probabilities, which is actually a science in itself with the normal distribution, or "bell-curve", being the most well-known.

All this can be verified by statistic probabilities, where you with the proper input data can get a vague idea how likely an incidence will occur, all based on the number of samples. With enough number of samples, as if you play the craps 10000 times in Las Vegas, the chance for the number of snake eyes are 1/6* 1/6 * 10000, which is 278 of your throws.

But random doesn't have a memory, if you throw the dice and get snake eyes three times in a row you might think;
"Highly unlikely that will happen again" and bet the farm on it.
Chance is still the same and your farm could be lost to someone you don't care very much for.

As for "racing luck", with only 20 samples or so in a season, it's not enough to get statistical about.

[Mr Alcatraz]

I've noticed a driver that cosistantly has bad luck can be easily spotted. He is the one that shows up at the track with Hell Hounds on his trail.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYTTtHTodSM

[marcush.]

my favorite quote :
Development is only necessary because of the ignorance of the engineers not doing their job -keith duckworth-
absolutely.Today I had the special highlight of the week:Fuelpump assembly cannot be mounted into tank thanks to the clever engineer "forgetting" to allow for the float and lever also having to go through the mounting hole ....
bad luck ...certainly.

[gato azul]

nice question(s)
I think, it will depend on your (or anyones) definition of good/bad luck.
I do agree to the general thesis, that you basicly "make your own luck" more often then not,
nevertheless you will never be in a position, being it in racing or engineering to predict/control
all variables. At one point, certainlly in racing, you have to make your move, make a decision based
on what little you know, this more often then not involves some assumptions (to take a recent F1 example
track temperature/weather on race day, possibilities of an safety car etc), you will most likely allways have
"insufficient" data. So after you have made your choive (setup, strategy etc.) and the "chips are down" you
can hope/pray or do whatever you see fit, and hope, that you have made the correct assumption/educated guess -
whatever. Sometimes it will go your way, sometimes it will not, so if you see "radomness" as an version/element of luck,
then yes, I do think you find it in racing, and in engineering as well.

Zero defect in field is a aim, rather then reality, just look at the numerous ( if I want to be cynical, I would say ever
increasing) numbers on manufacturer recalls, be it automotive, households goods or aerospace. (A380 cracks anyone).

Yes, you can try to predict "probabilities" and base decisons on them, but every distribution has it´s "fat tails", and none
will prevent the "black swan" event. That holds true for almost anything, from racing, over engineering to the stock/currenct markets.
All are based on assumptions, at one point or the other, every computer simulation, however advanced makes some assumptions about variables etc., so if we see that bid of "radomness &/or unpredictability" as "luck", then yes I do thing you can have it one way or the other ( good or bad).

Sure, on the other hand you can blame almost anything onto someone/something else and his dog.
Not every event (in racing or otherwise) is down to "luck" or is entirely random and "unforseen", more often then not it´s just a matter of "hoping for the best" and try to get away with things, in engineering today more often then not, based on costs.

You will find many examples all over the place, from collapsing supermarket (slacking off the building code) to insufficient amounts of deiceing agents at airports, or insufficient amounts of winter preparations for roads to underspect trains (ICE) and/or aircrafts, just because for about 10 years snow, was a rather rare occurence in Central West Europe.
Now, that things "just go back to normal" (a.k.a. snow in winter) things turn into chaos.
This has nothing to do with "luck", just with making assumptions based on history, and projecting some things forward, assuming, everything will stay the same, just because that what happened last time/year etc.

So to come back "on topic" a DRS (or other mechanical) failure is not "bad luck", but a safety car at the "wrong" time or getting the weather forecast wrong, beeing involved in someone elses incidents etc, can have elements of good/bad luck to it.(randomness) IMHO

[Jersey Tom]

In all practical sense, yes, there is "bad luck" in racing. There are certainly things which you either completely out of your control or impossible to prepare for.

And they certainly can be bad.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

I believe it does.

When you have 2 equal drivers, I mean perfectly equal, the deciding factor will be luck.
Schumacher is a driver I feel is going through a torrid spell of bad luck. Honestly, I think the guy booted a black cat smashing a mirror while walking under a ladder.
His team are mostly responsible for this, but the recipient of it is Schumacher, and of course his team.

(hard work + preparation) x (time)
—————————————————-
(statistical fluctuations)

This here is a Formula for luck.

Now the problem as I see it is that in Schumacher's case the the Numerator's appear in order.
Yet the Denominators do not.

Statistical fluctuations can make the best driver on the planet look an absolute tit. If you have fewer fluctuations, your luck will be better. How do you change this?
Probably the way most people do....Pray.

[strad]

Ask Chris Amon

[Cam]

Anything directly controlled by a human, when it goes wrong is human error - whether thats making something that breaks or controlling something, like a wheel or tool and an error occurs. It's preventable. Time, skill, procedure or materials will solve that and prevent it every single time.

Bad Luck is when a bird flies into your helmet at 300kmh. No-one could predict that and no-one can prevent it. That is bad luck. I don't see too many drivers with bad luck.

[raymondu999]

Personally, (despite my constant "karmic hedging" in the form of betting) I don't really believe in luck. I rather despise the notion of it, personally. To me you make your own luck. "Bad luck" is really a rather weak excuse for not doing a good job. "Back luck" to me is only applicable when it happens on a factor outside of your control.

Eg. if a driver has an engine blow up after using the engine for 8 races - then well... that's not bad luck. That's just you overstepping the mark. If it blows up on the first lap you take it out, without you having a mistaken installation, and without you abusing it (either by slamming the block in the wall, or overstressing, like maybe shifting to first gear when you're at 350kph) then that's luck - it was a defect that you couldn't have controlled.

If you isolate the driver himself in Formula One - then to a sense there is such a statistical probability of getting the short matchstick. But the team is ultimately also part of the package. The way the team sets a car up, the way they prepare the car, the way a car was designed (remember how Newey used to just make every part "good enough," then pile on tonnes of downforce and hope the car would make it through the race?) all are decisions that potentially have a disastrous butterfly effect

[Mr Alcatraz]

I think it would be fair to say that from Felipe Massa's perspective he had bad luck when he was struck on his melon by the spring off Ruben's car. But the reason it flew off was that something failed probably due to human error. So the spring fell off of RB's rig, whoops someone may have not seated it properly, who actually knows.? Perhaps another driver had good luck because at some point he was going to be precisely where FM was but for whatever reason wasn’t. Maybe it was Kimi and he decided to have some ice cream, or a shyte. So that was where and when whatever happenedd happened. I know one thing for sure; FM had a hell of a headache.

[raymondu999]

I think it would be fair to say that from Felipe Massa's perspective he had bad luck when he was struck on his melon by the spring off Ruben's car.

Yes - it was bad luck for Felipe in that he just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, and it was a factor outside of his control.

But the reason it flew off was that something failed probably due to human error.

Agreed. From Rubens' perspective losing that spring was not bad luck. Agreed.

[Mr Alcatraz]

Ok Ray so you and I are in total agreement for once?

[raymondu999]

That was luck

[Red Schneider]

There is lots of luck. The difference between Clark and Fangio is luck.

Having said that, a lot of the day-to-day talk about bad luck is just excuses. People are either ignorant or too dense to learn from their mistakes. Look at any 'driver reactions' press release after qualifying or the race, and anyone who failed to meet expectations is prone to blame lady luck.

Incidentally one reason I find the term 'racing incident' slightly distasteful is that it ascribes the event entirely to luck. "There is was nothing I could do" or "the other guy did a stupid thing" is the cheap way out. Rather than mining for improvements or changes on their own part that could be made to avoid 'bad luck', too many drivers throw their hands up and walk away without even bothering to see if they can learn anything.

In sum, I would say day-to-day luck doesn't exist, or only exists so minimally it may be detrimental to think about. If you are striving for the championship day after day over the course of a season, it wouldn't be wise to bleat "bad luck" every time something doesn't go your way. On the other hand, over the course of a career there are vast cosmic forces at play. See my first line.