Austin bumps were “at the limit” for F1, says Ocon

F1 traveled to the United States Grand Prix last weekend and was expecting a tough time off the bumps after complaints about them surfaced there during the recent MotoGP event.

But while the bumps didn’t cause safety concerns for the F1 drivers, they caused several headaches for the teams.

Because the repeated violent bumps not only required some compromises in suspension and ride height to ensure the cars could traverse the bumps, but also took their toll on the machine.

Red Bull had to repair a hairline crack on Max Verstappen’s rear wing while several cars – including Ocon – suffered breakdowns on Sunday that could be caused by the bumps.

When asked by Motorsport.com if he thought the bumps were acceptable for a modern F1 circuit, Ocon said, “I think you are at the limit.

“You are at the limit of reliability and I think [if they go] a little more when we come back next year and it’s another step then I think the cars are really going to have problems.

“If you’re going slowly it’s not a big problem, but as soon as you’re going fast and there is a big knock on the ground, the suspension, the engineers see red alarms and heavy loads.

“Of course we shouldn’t see that. So I think the track will need some work for next year. “

Also read:

Mercedes track engineer Andrew Shovlin admitted the bumps weren’t easy to work with, but said his team was preparing for bigger problems.

“It was pretty tricky and very difficult to say if that was a bigger issue for us than at Red Bull,” he said.

“I think the Red Bull had a stronger rear here and when you overheat [the tyres] and hop around like that, the back handle is your friend. I think this is an area where your car seems to be doing very well.

“But we were probably set for bigger issues with the car set-up and the bump damage, and it seemed to be doing reasonably well.”