F1’s new rules: The thorny issues facing the sport over racing, qualifying and safety
There are two ways to look at a racing driver’s job.
First of all, it is to get the car given to them as quickly as possible in one lap. In this sense, nothing has changed.
But on a more philosophical level, F1 is intended to be the ultimate challenge; The rider pushes his machine and himself to the limit of what is possible. In this sense, it has changed a lot.
There is near consensus that the difficulty of a straight qualifying round has decreased as a result of the demand for energy management. There is no such thing as a straight tour anymore.
Some of the sport’s toughest corners have been made less challenging as they are now what Fernando Alonso calls “charging zones”.
At some circuits drivers are forced to ‘lift and slide’ by lifting the accelerator before corners so the electric motor can work against the engine to achieve the best overall performance in qualifying.
Suzuka, which hosted the Japanese Grand Prix last weekend and is arguably considered the toughest circuit on the calendar, was a testing ground for the new rules. And in the eyes of the drivers, the rules failed to achieve this.
Perhaps the most technically demanding racetrack on the planet, the Esses has been designated a “zero kilowatt zone” where teams cannot use electrical power.
This meant the engines were running there at roughly half power. The speed changes between corners were not much different than before and grip was still limited in the corners, but this changed the nature of the challenge.
Worse were the two Degner corners.
As McLaren team principal Andrea Stella puts it: “Degner One has always been one of the corners that drivers will talk about in a season. Like, which are the toughest corners? This is one of them.”
“Now, you’re thinking about the battery as you go through the corner, you’re not thinking about just sticking with it and gaining half a tenth. This is now a corner where you almost get up and roll, and then between Degner One and Two you have to avoid going into electric because using your battery that way is not going to be efficient.”
The same was true entering the Spoon Curve and Turns One and Two.
Norris said a lap at Suzuka “still felt special” but admitted losing nearly 37 mph from the high-speed 130R corner to braking for a chicane because the car ran out of electricity “hurts the soul.”
Meanwhile, Leclerc cursed his team on the radio after Saturday’s session, saying: “I really can’t stand these new rules in qualifying. I go faster in the corners, I hit the gas earlier… I lose everything on the straights!”
In fact, drivers are forced to take a series of actions to qualify that McLaren driver Oscar Piastri described as “counter-intuitive”.
Leclerc said: “Consistency is about paying more than being brave and doing something you’ve never tried before, which is embarrassing and makes qualifying a little less challenging. That’s something we have to work on.”
“This is a known problem. Neither the FIA nor the teams accept the situation as it is. There is a lot of work behind the scenes and I hope we can find a solution as soon as possible.”
