2012 F1 Season

[Brent]

What's your take on this year's season?
Like the results so far?
Who do you think are gonna be the top teams this year?

[Paul]

i'm just glad i haven't seen that damn finger again!

[DTNS]

mclaren has the car to beat, mercedes has a quick car but lacks race pace and reliability, lotus-renault seem to have a good car. red bull has better race pace than qualifying. they seem to be most affected by the blown diffuser ban.


I hope to see the Iceman on the podium again this year. 

[niky]

McLaren is consistently fastest, from qualifying to race pace, but they are suffering from more tire wear than before.They had more mechanical grip than RBR last year, and that's carried over. The low nose seems to be working well for them, and their sidepod exhaust extenders seem to be good for diffuser air flow.

Red Bull's qualifying issue is similar to McLaren's last year... they're not the quickest in qualifying, but during the race, they're great. The RBR is still a fantastic car, and it's got most of the rest of the field licked, despite the Renault's lack of power. The good fuel economy of the Renault engine, smaller fuel load and the light KERS package make them great over the length of a grand prix. Maybe when they start playing with exhaust placement, they'll catch up in qualifying.

Mercedes is second fastest in qualifying due to their DRS-duct system, which seems to stall the front wings by activating a duct under the rear wing when DRS is open. Theory is the duct feeds air to a channel that reroutes air coming from other ducts and vents into one that exits at the front wing. This makes the Mercedes more balanced than other cars with DRS open and allows them to trim the car for higher top speed, to boot. Doesn't translate to race pace because you can only use your DRS when overtaking in the race. Plus there's the issue of Mercedes tire wear... which is severe.

Renault-Lotus seems to have a fantastic car this year. Strangely, it seems even better sorted than Red Bull. But with how topsy-turvy the first two races have been, it remains to be seen how they stack up against the big two over the season. I'm betting on Kimi for at least a podium this year, if not an outright (probably lucky) win.

Ferrari's car this year is complete and utter sh**. Terrible balance. Twitchy. All over the place. That Fernando won a race in the rain tells you more about Alonso's ability than the car's. The true measure of the Ferrari's speed is seen in Massa's dreary results. Tuning that unique pullrod suspension is probably part of the issue,  but as an overall package, that Ferrari isn't any better than a mid-pack car. Sergio Perez's Sauber was faster in the last race. That's better than in Australia, where the car was decidedly lower-midpack.

The team to really watch is Sauber. They've had two good races in a row, and the package looks very good. I doubt they'll be able to develop as quickly as the bigger teams, but only time will tell.

[DTNS]

Williams also seem to have a good car this season. their drivers just need to make them reach the finish line.

[Brent]

Sauber has a better engineered chassis and aero. Hence the faster laptimes despite running the older Ferrari engine. Good to see them up there in the standings, certainly nice to see new faces and not just the usual suspects. Makes F1 less boring.

[Brent]

Here's Alex Yoong's forecast for this weekend...

http://www.autoindustriya.com/in-the-drivers-seat/overtaking-fest-at-the-2012-chinese-grand-prix.html

[DTNS]

Here's Alex Yoong's forecast for this weekend...

http://www.autoindustriya.com/in-the-drivers-seat/overtaking-fest-at-the-2012-chinese-grand-prix.html

wow! I didn't know alex yoong wrote for AI now.

[niky]

wow! I didn't know alex yoong wrote for AI now.

Holy crap, Brent... Scoooooooore!!! (envy, envy, envy!)

Alex is a great commentator at STAR... fantastic that you've got him doing stuff for AI!

-

That said, I don't think pace is as close as he says... McLaren definitely has front-of-the-pack pace sewn up. It's Red Bull that needs to fight with the Lotus, Mercedes and Sauber teams for position.

That Sauber is proving to be a very quick car. We saw a little of it in the first race... more in the second... I wouldn't bet on them being lower than fifth here in China...

[Brent]

We've had the Alex Yoong column since 2010. You guys haven't been navigating through the site that much I guess.

[Brent]

Impressive results for old man Schumi in practice leading the pack.

[DTNS]

Impressive results for old man Schumi in practice leading the pack.

lets hope the two or more Mercedes GP cars finish this time.

[Paul]

they have sucky race pace so expect them to go backwards during the race.

[DTNS]

on the side note, it looks like Red Bull's 2012 car is better suited to Webber's driving style rather than Vettel's.

[luwe]

Pity what happened to Schumi and Button due to pitting