Follows on nicely to Paul's link of Mike Lawrence's slamming of Abu Dhabi.

From an interview with Sam Michael:

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/80109

"One of the things that wasn't addressed in the 2009 rule changes was
circuit design. If you look at tracks like Barcelona where nobody
overtakes, and take exactly the same cars to tracks like Monza, Hockenheim
etc, there's plenty of overtaking. The difference is circuit layout."

...

"If you look at somewhere like Abu Dhabi, there are some good aspects to
the circuit, but there are fundamental mistakes. There wasn't good enough
racing there and the organisers need to rectify that before next year. You
can't keep blaming car design."

--
CatharticF1

"What you thought was freedom is just greed."

CatharticF1 wrote:
I replied to that article - and I'm gob-smacked by the volume of
illiterate and utterly ignorant comment which followed. None of it was a
response to my comment, thank God, but all of it closely resembles the
Private Eye "From the Boards" spoof column, which consists of idiot text
(txt) based bollocks.

Though Sam Michael has a point in citing track design as a cause of lack
of overtaking, I firmly believe that the plank and diffusers are a
bigger problem and that we should allow ground effect back. As I said in
response to the article, in the early 80s ground effect turbos were
capable of close racing as if like Formula Ford...



--

Chris

I am not young enough to know everything.
Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900)

Noj wrote:
?? Frank is designing tracks now?

--

Chris

I am not young enough to know everything.
Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900)

CatharticF1 wrote:

I think he somewhat contradicts with himself.

"One of the things that wasn't addressed in the 2009 rule changes was
circuit design. If you look at tracks like Barcelona where nobody
overtakes, and take exactly the same cars to tracks like Monza,
Hockenheim etc, there's plenty of overtaking. The difference is
circuit layout."

"Organisers need to look closer at creating slower speed corners which
feed onto straights, and at removing chicanes."

He says Monza has plenty of overtaking then wants to remove chicanes.
Goodbye plenty of overtaking at Monza.

As for slow corners feeding onto straights, that's excatly what Tilke
is famous for.

Yas Marina didn't provide much overtaking, but was the increase in the
gaps between cars a track feature, or just a coincidence? I'll wait
for another year to judge that. The circuit itself has at least one
good overtaking place (exactly in a manner Michael wants), but most of
the time the cars weren't close enough to have a chance to overtake.

Barcelona is awful though. They could have done the new chicane in a
better way and still increase the runoff (which was the reason to the
change).

-Webs-

On Nov 10, 4:20*am, Noj <m... (AT) nomail (DOT) afraid.org> wrote:

Nothing to do with him. He just takes care of the commercial side of
things. He has no interest in track design - though he may get picky
about the condition of the grandstands. FIA inspect the tracks, but
that's in terms of safety requirements and possibly to ensure that the
pits are up to scratch.

Even if Bernie or FIA said "there must be at least two corners which
provide a clear overtaking opportunity" then how is that going to be
enforced - especially for F1 cars. When F1 returned to South Africa in
1992 they found a very different Kyalami. The guy running the track
referred to a certain section, known as "the mineshaft", as being "an
overtaking rich environment". And it may have been for Formula Vees
and saloon car racing. It didn't work out that way for F1 cars.

I think the problem may be too much design. Did they hire engineers
and architects when they laid out Monza or Silverstone or Spa?

On Nov 10, 3:58*am, mower man <nos... (AT) f2s (DOT) com> wrote:

I recall a study in the early 90s which suggested that limited ground
effects, or an extended diffuser, and much smaller wings were the way
to go. However I find the work done by the OTG hard to fault, and
certainly the cars have been able to get much closer to each other
this year.

Bob Dubery wrote:

You can't go back. World was different then.

Monza and Silverstone were designed pretty much from scratch, as there
wasn't much there (well, an airfield in Silverstone). Spa, on the
other hand was normal roads, but it was redesigned by someone I
couldn't find quickly. Does it matter whether they were engineers or
architects? Some of them might have been.

Silverstone has been redesigned so many times, there's probably no-one
to be responsible of the current layout.

So is it bad, if someone designs a circuit for a certain purpose?
Monza and Silverstone (and the new Spa) were. You can't design
circuits that have evolved through the years anyway.

-Webs-

Bob Dubery <megapode (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote in
news:0cb5ceb2-8188-4412-883e-0495698c6bd3 (AT) p8g2000yqb (DOT) googlegroups.com:

And that is the problem, isn't it?
It's about money and facilities and while the facilities in many cases
could do with improvement it would be better if Bernie were more
passionate about the circuit design.

- though he may get picky
Once upon a time racing was about going as fast as possible and the
corners only existed to get them back gradually or suddenly to where
they started!

I think that philosophy while overly simplistic but might make a better
starting point than the carpark based crap we get now.

And stop building them in the middle of cities and concrete!


--
CatharticF1

"What you thought was freedom is just greed."

On Nov 10, 5:52*am, CatharticF1 <rasf1pos... (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote:
space to park motor homes. And come on... we know where this is going.
The moment he tries to say there must be X overtaking opportunities in
a lap the circuit owners will respond with one or more of
a) Look at how the formula fords are overtaking
b) How do we know that F1 cars CAN'T overtake until F1 cars race here?
c) We'll do that when you make the same demands of Monaco
d) The problem is the way the F1 cars are built - nothing to do with
our track.

It'll never fly.

I would actually like to see some thought given to this matter, but I
don't believe it's Bernie's job to do this. It comes down to rules,
and Bernie doesn't make the rules. It's FIA's job.

And it would be impossible to police anyway. How do you legislate
this?
<snip>
emphasis on safety - so that must impact on circuit design.
As long as they allow F1 there they can't make too many demands about
other circuits. At least the others have proper run-off areas.

The Brazilian track is in an urban area. That doesn't seem to have
caused any problems as regards the track layout. Other than the
drainage, but then that's what you get for not using Tilke :-P

On Nov 10, 2:52*pm, CatharticF1 <rasf1pos... (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote:
What about long beach? In 198? John Watson raced from stone motherless
last to win (i think), 25 cars passed by JW, how could that be on a
tight street circuit? Maybe it was the car?

beers,
build