If either of them has to take on more fresh elements – and recent events suggest that Hamilton is closer to the edge than his rival – that could make the difference in such a close World Cup.
Of course, a championship will be won and lost over an entire season and 22 races this year.
As hated as they are by some, there are grid penalties in Formula 1 for very good reasons. The aim is to reduce costs by controlling the number of physical components manufacturers must produce per season, while at the same time limiting development by forcing those manufacturers to extend the life of each part.
Without this ongoing cost control, F1 may not have all of the manufacturers it currently has online because they cannot justify their commitment. And there would be a greater difference in performance between suppliers.
As such, grid sentences, unpopular as they are, should perhaps be viewed as a necessary evil.
In fact, you’ve been racing in Formula 1 for quite a while. In the last few years of the V8 era, there were eight engines per season, with a ninth generating a grid penalty.
However, the rule was rarely triggered. The only drivers ever penalized were Felipe Massa (Singapore 2010), Rubens Barrichello (Abu Dhabi 2011) and Charles Pic (Korea 2012).
In 2013, the last season of the V8 formula, nobody took a ninth engine.
When the hybrid rules were introduced in 2014, the restrictions became much more complex, with the propulsion broken down into the six elements we know today and an initial limit of five examples per season.
Despite the immaturity of the technology and early reliability problems, in retrospect, manufacturers have kept the limits fairly well this year.
The first man to receive a penalty under the new rules was Daniil Kvyat, whose Toro Rosso required a sixth Renault V6 at the Italian GP. Subsequently, Pastor Maldonado, Jean-Eric Vergne, Romain Grosjean, Sebastian Vettel and Kvyat (again) received penalties before the end of the year, all of them Renault users.
In the second season of the hybrid regulations, two things happened: the overall limit was reduced to four, and Honda arrived at McLaren with a hopelessly unreliable engine, while at the same time bringing with it the philosophy of regular strategic changes to test new developments.
After just six offenses on the grid in 2014, there were 37 in 2015. By the end of the season, McLaren drivers Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button had both used up to twelve examples of some elements – and in Mexico the latter was assigned a 55- Place penalty.
Due to a longer season with 21 races in 2016, the limit was reset to five elements and there were fewer penalties. The requirement was again reduced to four in 2017, and there was again a long list of offenses. It got even tighter in 2018 when the limit for V6, Turbo and MGU-H was reduced to three and for MGU-K, energy storage and control electronics to just two.
Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes W12
Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images
In the current eighth year of the hybrid regulations, the manufacturers have pushed the limits further and further, and it is obviously not easy to bring the season, which now comprises 22 races, to an end, especially if – as with Mercedes – a specific reliability problem arises. Of the eight Mercedes users, only Lando Norris and Lance Stroll will have to accept a penalty in 2021.
The system continues to frustrate fans and competitors alike, but the problem is that no one has come up with a viable alternative.
“I think the penalty system for engines is pretty robust,” says Mercedes-F1 boss Toto Wolff.
“Because what we have to avoid is that we build engines in such a way that they only deliver top performance for a few races.
“And if you change the regulations and say, okay, there is no grid penalty for the driver, just constructor points, it still means that when you are fighting for a driver’s championship, teams just throw engines at them.” this car.
“And I think if we can find good solutions, it’s definitely worth a look. It’s confusing to the new fans why an engine penalty out of the driver’s responsibility brings him to the bottom of the grid, or 10 or five places down.” . And that’s clearly not great, but I don’t have any solutions. “
One anomaly in the system is that once you get past your fourth example, the penalties become less severe.
When just one item is problematic and you just need to change that you can only get away with a 10-place penalty for the fourth example, and then only five-place if you take your fifth or sixth example, or even beyond – like that Case with Valtteri Bottas taking a V6 in Austin.
This aspect of the rules was introduced when Honda struggled in the early days to alleviate its dire reliability problems. But it can now be used strategically to introduce a new V6 late in the year at a relatively low cost, when competitors are still cautiously extending the life of engines that have lost their lead.
“I think that’s probably old Honda legs,” says Wolff. “When you’re in a situation where things just go terribly wrong and you have to change engine parts or entire gensets, you shouldn’t penalize every single race to get back on the grid or lose 10 places.
“So it’s almost an anti-embarrassment rule. And I think that’s fine, but of course we have to see how we do it in the future? It’s biting us hard this year though.”
McLaren team boss Andreas Seidl agrees that the current system remains a logical way to curb development and performance.
“I understand, of course, that having all these penalties is not ideal,” he says.
“But to be honest, I don’t see a really easy solution to that. Because if you decide, for example, we go to four engines instead of three, then we will all end up with five engines because we would simply rev up the engines. “
“In the end, it just shows that all of the manufacturing teams are pushing each other so hard that we’re all pushing the technology we’re using to the absolute limit or beyond, and that ends up in problems or problems. So we just have to accept that for the moment and move on. “
Alpine CEO Marcin Budkowski admits that manufacturers can play the system, but there is no point in doing so.
“At the end of the day, you will design an engine to work in a certain way for a certain amount of time,” he says.
“Nothing in the regulations prevents you from designing an engine in such a way that it drives three races and changes all three races and only has to take a lot of penalties.
“It probably won’t be an advantage from a championship standpoint over the course of a season.
“[The rules] are there for cost reasons, of course, but nothing prevents you from designing an engine for shorter life and better performance if you are willing to accept the penalties. “
Budkowski has an interesting perspective as he worked for the FIA for a short time, where he had the opportunity to study alternatives.
Marcin Budkowski, Managing Director, Alpine F1
Photo by: Charles Coates / Motorsport Images
“Some people hate grid fines, and I haven’t met a fan of grid fines,” he says. “But since I was on the other side of the fence at the FIA and then on the team, I’ve been thinking for years about an alternative that would be better than the current one, and I couldn’t find one that means there isn’t one, but it is least worst case.
“Now if we had four and three instead of three and two, we would probably see a lot less penalties, but would people then also develop engines that take more risks and then have to use a fifth? It’s a never-ending story.
“You have to draw the line somewhere. Four and three would have been more adapted to the season because we would have seen fewer penalties.
“It is a debate that we have to have in the Formula One Commission and such institutions to see where we want to put the cursor? Nowadays, increasing the number of engines means increasing costs for everyone.”
FIA Race Director Michael Masi, one of the men involved in drafting the sports regulations for penalties, emphasizes that there has not yet been a formal debate about alternatives.
“No, it didn’t,” he says. “Every team that drives according to exactly the same rules knows from the start of the year how many units and how many transmissions and other various resources they will have.
“Everyone has the same understanding of what to do. Every team, especially in the championship battle, but everyone will try to gain as much competitive advantage as they need with powertrain and aerodynamic updates.” whatever it is. “
Grid penalties are clearly not an ideal system and they will be even less popular when the nightmare scenario hits and a penalty plays a pivotal role if Hamilton or Verstappen lose the title in 2021.
But until someone finds a viable alternative that addresses key component cost issues and keeps development reasonably under control, the F1 stays with them.
The post Why F1 is stuck with its “anti-embarrassment” engine penalty rules first appeared on monter-une-startup.
