Various facts from the Bahrain pratice race 10th of July

[Nicolai Nicholson]

Pit stop time:
Reik lost 37,5 seconds and 38,5 seconds in the pits, in total 76 seconds
Helder lost 40,5 and 35 seconds in the pits, in total 75,5 seconds

Marko lost 47,5 seconds in the pits
Sean lost 45 seconds in the pits

Dino lost 41 seconds and 39 seconds in the pits, in total 80 seconds
David lost 42 seconds and 40 seconds in the pits, in total 82 seconds

Jim lost 54,5 seconds in the pits
Duco lost 61 seconds in the pits

Vince lost 49 seconds and 47 seconds in the pits, in total 96 seconds
Nicolai lost 39 seconds and 37,5 seconds in the pits, in total 76,5 seconds

Nicolas lost 50 seconds in the pits

Vale lost 39 seconds and 38 seconds in the pits, in total 77 seconds
kennett lost 40 seconds and 42 seconds in the pits, in total 82 seconds

These are rough numbers, and many are "polluted with mistakes. However, I suspect those in green are reasonably well executed.

From this it looks like the 2 stoppers spend 30 seconds more in the pits than the 1 stoppers at Bahrain (assuming well executed pit stops). 30 seconds divided on 38 laps = 0,79 seconds per lap. This is how much faster the 2 stopper need to be on average.

I included two pictures, one is all the lap times of all racers (green is 2 stop, red is 1 stop), the other a graph displaying the top 4 drivers' race. The dotted lines are made by me to illustrate interesting aspects

 

[Nicolas Rouge]

Very interesting Nicolai, thanks for sharing. The most important thing to note is that 1-stoppers were 1-2 seconds slower per lap in general than the 2-stoppers, so that proves 2-stops is best, at least on this track.

I also think that 2-stop strategy could be optimized with, for instance, a full tank at the start of the race : the first stint would be slower, but the first stop much quicker. Maybe a good idea when you start from the back of the grid...

 

[David Turnbull]

very good info nico thanks

dont think theres much doubt that x2 wear could make for much more strategic races.

 

[Vincenzo Cavaliere]

Thanks Nico

 

[Kennett Ylitalo]

Nice graphs, good job, Nico. Off-topic: my laptimes are consistent. Slow but consistent. Better than what they would've been on season 10 /end off-topic.

It looks very close, with pit speed limiters we would have few seconds more added to two stop tactic. Bahrain pits were 430m long.

Average 200km/h, 400m pit takes ~7s.
Pit limited speed of 70km/h average that same distance takes ~20s (used 70 as some tracks have 80, some 60km/h limit..)

So that gives us ~15s added to two stoppers. 15s / 38Laps = 0.3s per lap. The exact amount is even more as you need to slow down once and accelerate twice, and F3000 are doing more than 200km/h past pitwall. Estimated 0.5s per lap or am i completely wrong? I've been recently a lot wrong so please check those numbers... It seems we are close, very very close to target..

EDIT: Checked Montreal pit for comparison and it's 300m long. Where is the longest pit next season? ed2: Spa, of course...ed3: Spa is 390 for F1 but 800m if we use the touring car pit exit (F1 pit exit is hundred times safer than touring car exit and the track allows it...)..

 

[Reik Major]

I also thought about taking the short F1 exit through the pylons. But it needs to be tested accurately not to get any unexpected trouble like miscounting laps or penalties or so...

Edit: On the other hand I think with tyre wear 2x a 2-stopper would be the most common choice on the most tracks, even with pit limiter. So why not take the long exit at Spa to give the 1-stoppers a better chance here?

Btw: The way you painted your arrows to illustrate the danger when exiting pits after Eau Rouge makes sense, but in all the races we had at Spa, I don't remember a big pit exit incident, right? Also when exiting Eau Rouge and touching the right side curb, it follows a natural car movement to go back to the left side afterwards. So even when I drive a natural line out of Eau Rouge it is no problem for me to stay away from the pit exit zone (or in oher words to drive "around it"). In addition I can see the exiting car early enough and it has to stay on the right track side. You know what I mean?

 

[Nicolai Nicholson]

What I am a bit curious about is if Marko and Sean had the same pace potential as Reik and Helder. For one the qualify lap of 3rd and 4th place was around 1 second slower than 1st and 2nd.

The first part (start until 2 stoppers pit first time) of the race the only difference is the weight of the cars, (a bit more than 30kg). My question is (first and foremost to Marko and Sean), is the difference in lap times the first part of the race only a result of the wight difference, or would you have been slower even though you had the same setup?

The last part the only difference assumably is tyre wear (as all cars should have roughly the same amount of fuel left after last pitstop of the 2 stoppers).

 

[Marko Vuori]

What I am a bit curious about is if Marko and Sean had the same pace potential as Reik and Helder. For one the qualify lap of 3rd and 4th place was around 1 second slower than 1st and 2nd.

I am not sure if I understand this correctly, but according to my replay Reik's pole time was 1:43.690 (Helder 1:43.755, me 1:43.956, Sean 1:44.037), and the difference from 1st to 4th only 0.347 seconds, making me think we all were in the same pace.

The first part (start until 2 stoppers pit first time) of the race the only difference is the weight of the cars, (a bit more than 30kg). My question is (first and foremost to Marko and Sean), is the difference in lap times the first part of the race only a result of the wight difference, or would you have been slower even though you had the same setup?

The first part of my race was affected by Sean and David's accident on lap 3 (I lost ~ 2 secs) and after that when 2 stoppers overtaking me (Dino on lap 10, David on lap 13). Otherwise I was driving as fast as I could, but at the same time saving tyres. At the end of each stint I felt that I had considerably less grip left than at the end of stints in season 10 and the rear of the car was sliding a lot (my rear tyres were wearing more than front tyres). My guess is two stoppers were able to go flat out for the whole race, whereas I was forced to save tyres in the beginning of stints, and drive carefully at the end of stints, because of the loss of grip. So, I don't think I had been slower than Reik or Helder with 2 stopper tactics.

 

[Nicolai Nicholson]

I am not sure if I understand this correctly, but according to my replay Reik's pole time was 1:43.690 (Helder 1:43.7, me 1:43.956, Sean 1:44.037), and the difference from 1st to 4th only 0.347 seconds, making me think we all were in the same pace.

My mistake, I looked at the best lap times instead of qualify time

But that is good news I think, then it is easier to analyse the data. Can we then suspect that 33 kg or whatever the difference was in weight can be translated into (very roughly) 1,2 seconds a lap?

 

[Marko Vuori]

But that is good news I think, then it is easier to analyse the data. Can we then suspect that 33 kg or whatever the difference was in weight can be translated into (very roughly) 1,2 seconds a lap?

Just looking at lap times without any deeper analysis 1.2 secs seems to be good enough estimate. Next time we do tyre wear testing, I suggest we assign strategies by starting grid, not starting rows (for example, odd starting grid=2 stopper, even starting grid=1 stopper). It mixes the driver pace/strategy even better than when using rows.

I think in season 10 I did not pay much attention on that my race setup wears front and rear tyres evenly, and I think it did not matter, but I see now that with tyre wearx2, if I want to take a long stint, I would have to consider that too. On the other hand, it was very clear in this race that 2 stopper was the better choice. So, choosing 2 stopper strategy I could once again forget uneven tyre wear between front and rear tyres in my race setup...

EDIT: One more thing: If we start to use pit speed limit, does it also mean we are forced to use flag rules? I am against using pit speed limit, if speeding on the pit lane does not mean penalty.

 

[Nicolai Nicholson]

EDIT: One more thing: If we start to use pit speed limit, does it also mean we are forced to use flag rules? I am against using pit speed limit, if speeding on the pit lane does not mean penalty.

If we turn on the pit speed limit the flag rules will be on (penalty for speeding in pit lane, ignoring blue flag and cutting the track).

As most others have said, we need to do something to even out the strategies a bit, and the simplest is to turn on the pit speed limit. If we need even more adjusting next step would be to reduce the length of the race, but hopefully pit speed limit will be enough.

One might wonder though, how hopeless a 3 stop strategy would have been. I feel quite confident that it would have been faster than 1 stop (but not as fast as 2?). I feel it has been underestimated how much we are slowed down by extra weight and wear.

 

[Marko Vuori]

If we turn on the pit speed limit the flag rules will be on (penalty for speeding in pit lane, ignoring blue flag and cutting the track).

As most others have said, we need to do something to even out the strategies a bit, and the simplest is to turn on the pit speed limit. If we need even more adjusting next step would be to reduce the length of the race, but hopefully pit speed limit will be enough.

I would still prefer not to use pit speed limiter, as using it will cause some races to be decided by stop and go penalties (received by speeding on pit lane and accidental slight cuttings on chicanes). When flag rules are on, Race07 gives warnings from cutting corners and after 3 warnings, you get a stop and go penalty. In some corners, you get penalty very easily (for example some chicanes at Monza and Imola). In some others, you can cut very much without penalty (for example Curitiba T1-T2). I would rather try to fix the problem of even out different strategies by testing, if on some other tracks the strategies are more even with the rules we use now (tyre wear x2). If it's obvious 2 stopper is clearly quicker on all tracks, we could try tyre wear x3 (and maybe decreasing race length). Does anybody have reliable data on which tracks weared tyres most/least in season 10? We could then have test races on these tracks assigning 1, 2, or 3 stops to each driver. I think at least Hockenheim 1999 was not wearing tyres very much.

One might wonder though, how hopeless a 3 stop strategy would have been. I feel quite confident that it would have been faster than 1 stop (but not as fast as 2?). I feel it has been underestimated how much we are slowed down by extra weight and wear.

It would also be nice to know, how it would be in a track, which weared tyres the most in season 10.

 

[Nicolai Nicholson]

I do not have any data of what tracks wear the most, however my impression is that it is not "night and day" between the tracks.

I would like to mention another possible alternative (which might not work). As I have to edit the server file manually to acheive 2xwear, it could be that it also will accept e.g. the value 1.5 (or 1,5). This can easily be tested, but perhaps Kennett already have some insight on this?

I agree that everything else being the same, I prefer the flag rules turned off.

If we were to try 3x wear I assume we are looking for a balance between 2 and 3 stops (as 1 stop would be out of the question)?

ps: Just a little fun-fact; did you know Marko, since I am so rubbish at "feeling the car" and adjusting the setup accordingly, my strategy, or way of doing setups, is to aim for even wear between front and rear. My thinking is that if the wear is even then
a) the balance cannot be too bad
b) I keep the same relative balance throughout the stint

 

[Dino Paolini]

I can only provide my comparison between a 33min stint and a 22min stint i did on the practice servers, as this is my most accurate data. In the actual race i did too many mistakes and also lost time with some other stuff.

My difference was ~0,95s per lap in average (100l vs 70l fuel).

I would not like to use an higher wear than x2 though, as that would start to make the stints very short. I thought about the pit-speed limit without enabling it in the rules, but just doing it But yes, reducing the race time slightly would also work for x2.

I suggested the x2 tirewear simply for the fact that we use more of the tires again and that one is accomplished automaticaly, also multiple possible strategies as a possible bonus

I'll be there hopefully when/if we test a s11 track.

No 2 tracks are the same so it leaves quite some stuff to look forward to in s11.
btw: No 2 drivers are the same either^^

 

[Valerio Vinassa]

nice info at top of thread Nicolai thanks
no speed limiter in pit for me
I tried ( at home) for Bahrain race 3pits and was more light and easy drive the car with about 1sec. at lap better but the cost of 3 pits is high

 

[Marko Vuori]

I also think that reducing race time is a better mean to bring 1 and 2 stops more even with tyre wear x2 than using pit speed limit. We also have enough time to study the best race time, before season 11 starts.

I do not have any data of what tracks wear the most, however my impression is that it is not "night and day" between the tracks.

I agree that there will not be huge differences between tracks, but if I remember correctly there were 10-15% wear differences between tracks with tyre wear x1, which would mean 20-30% differences with tyre wear x2. I think that is enough to make variation to what is the better strategy, 1 or 2 stops. The problem is that I don't know, if Bahrain is high or low tyre wear circuit. My guess is it's quite average in this regard.

ps: Just a little fun-fact; did you know Marko, since I am so rubbish at "feeling the car" and adjusting the setup accordingly, my strategy, or way of doing setups, is to aim for even wear between front and rear. My thinking is that if the wear is even then
a) the balance cannot be too bad
b) I keep the same relative balance throughout the stint

That is a good way, if tyre wear plays significant role in the races, but I think this was not the case in season 10. My strategy for setups in season 10 was just to find the fastest possible setup and then make sure it works with heavy fuel load as well. I foremost trust the stopwatch and then my feel and telemetry

 

[Kennett Ylitalo]

nico: Interesting thought of using fractions instead of 2x on tire wear. I have no idea whether it will work, i doubt it but you never know if it is just another overlooked hidden feature.. There are a lot of them in this game (haven't yet found any that would allow to cheat with default content, with mods a however.. any missing parameter can be adjusted by the user.. some modders have left default parameters out from config files if they are engine defaults, it's the same with tracks, they can have additional or even modified objects..)

My race was maybe the most consistent of all times and had a great feeling how the car performance changed. I could go flat out until lap11 on each stint, then it was just a tad more front brakes and take it a bit easier. Didn't really affect laptimes, it was just a little mental note to watch out the obvious places and not to spin so much for the rest of the race. Better drivers most likely can go without changing anythin on their driving.

Pit limiter and flags/cut rules.. Yeah, that'll never work for such a long race, in Monza we'll have either rubbish race or lots of stop&go and we don't even do cuts here. Not to mention addon tracks, they are not always perfect..

@Reik: Spa long exit is very rarely dangerous, the track is so long that such occurrences usually never happen. And who ever exits the pits need to look for the map anyway and yeild if necessary. There should be no technical problems with the short exit, finish line extends to pits (laps are calculated correctly) and you need to only touch all the sector gates in right order to have a lap counted in. pitlimiter switches off when you return to inside track corridors from pit corridors. But your point of using the long exit especially so we got 1 stop strategies work better is a good one. I like long stints and heavy car at Spa

 

[Kennett Ylitalo]

Bahrain grip level: 1.0, ie default

 

[Sean Greenlaw]

Obviously the best way to compare would be everyone did with them self as there will be slight differences with everyone. Im not sure how far off pace to Reik and Helder I would have been, its entirely possible they could have had same gap if they to 1 stopped to I suppose but in trials with Helder previous night over 33 min I think it was about 7 secs and on same strategy. So I think 14 secs over a stint say, to the 30 in test race with a a few mistakes by myself maybe makes the strategy closer overall than I 1st thought, if comparing with your own pace. We would know if we rerun test say with everyone on opposite strategy.

I have a request Nico could you perhaps leave race server's with Bahrain 2x and 1.5x wear and me and David will do couple full races over the weekend and Monday hopefully to see what its like.
Also if anyone else has time or that we can then jump on anytime and give it a try and share our findings .

EDIT: also on pits Spa isn't a lot of the pit boxes/garages on other side ? so we would have to use long exit anyway as only some could use short exit.

 

[Nicolai Nicholson]

I have a request Nico could you perhaps leave race server's with Bahrain 2x and 1.5x wear and me and David will do couple full races over the weekend and Monday hopefully to see what its like.
Also if anyone else has time or that we can then jump on anytime and give it a try and share our findings ..

I was about to do as you say, but it does not work. Allow me to explain:
When opening a server I can control various parameters from a GUI. In reality the settings I chose gets written in a a file called dedicatedserver.ini. In the GUI I can only chose between "Normal" and "Off" in relation to tyre wear. This leaves the value "1" or "0" in the ini-file.

If I edit the ini-file and enter tyre wear = 2 and then run the dedicated server, the GUI will display a blank field for tyre wear. However, when I enter 1.5 or 1,5, it displayes normal, and when I check the ini-file the value have popped back to "1".

Therefore it is safe to conclude that we cannot use decimals

I agree with Sean that the findings from the race are very rough. I would say that atm we know that 2 stops is the fastest, and it is somewhere between 5 and 30 seconds faster than 1 stop.

To get better data a self-test as mentioned by Sean would be very valuable. One do not need to do 2 whole races to test, it is enough to do 1 33 min stint and 1 22 min stint without mistakes, and then we can calculate what the final time would be.

What servers should I open? Nurburgring, Bahrain or Hungaroring?