Motorsport
Technology
14 rabbit holes · 9 people exploring
Common starting questions
- What is ground effect in F1?
- Why did only six cars race the 2005 US Grand Prix?
- Can you go from a racing game to real racing?
- Why did F1 have a six-wheeled car?
- Why do racing tyres only grip at certain temperatures?
Rabbit holes
- how F1 pit stops got under two seconds
Around 20 people, one wheel nut per wheel, guns that spin it off in a blink, and a light instead of a lollipop. Once refuelling was banned in 2010, a stop was purely tyres and the times collapsed. The best ones now come in under two seconds.
Jonas Becker · 5 sources
- ground effect: banned in 1983, back in 2022, still bouncing
Shape the underside of the car like an upside-down wing and the low pressure under it pulls the car into the track. Lotus cracked it in the late 70s, with sliding skirts sealing the sides, and F1 mandated flat floors from 1983.
Dev Malhotra · 7 sources
- the 2005 US Grand Prix had six cars
Michelin couldn't guarantee its tyres were safe through Indy's banked final turn after a failure in practice. No compromise was agreed, so all 14 Michelin cars peeled into the pits after the formation lap. Ferrari won a race against two Jordans and two Minardis while the crowd booed.
Elena Marchetti · 5 sources
- F1's banned (and secret) innovations, a list that kept growing
Started with the fan car and couldn't stop. McLaren's F-duct in 2010. Renault's mass damper, a sprung weight inside the nose, banned in 2006. Mercedes' DAS in 2020, where pushing and pulling the steering wheel changed the front wheels' toe.
Sara Lindt · 6 sources
- the Gran Turismo players who became real racing drivers
Nissan and PlayStation ran a competition that took the fastest Gran Turismo players, put them through a driver boot camp, and raced them for real. The first winner, Lucas Ordóñez, finished second in class at Le Mans in 2011. Jann Mardenborough got an LMP2 class podium there in 2013.
Gabriel Souza · 6 sources
- F1 teams run a mission control back at the factory
The car streams data from hundreds of sensors to the garage, and from there to a room full of engineers at the factory watching tyre temps, brakes and engine data live. Two-way telemetry, where the pit wall changed settings on the car, was allowed briefly around 2001–2002 and then banned, which is why drivers are still the ones turning dials on the steering wheel.
Arjun Pillai · 6 sources
- the six-wheeled F1 car won a race
Four tiny 10-inch front wheels, meant to sit behind the front wing and cut drag. Tyrrell finished 1-2 with it in Sweden in 1976. It faded partly because Goodyear wasn't really developing tyres that small for one team, and later the rules just said four wheels.
moth · 5 sources
- racing tyres only work inside a temperature window
Jonas Becker · 5 sources
- the Brabham fan car raced once, won, and disappeared
Officially the fan was for engine cooling. Unofficially it sucked the air out from under the car. Lauda won the 1978 Swedish GP with it, and Brabham withdrew it after one race even though the FIA had said it could keep running it that season.
Dev Malhotra · 6 sources
- Pikes Peak: racing up a mountain where the air runs out
Twelve and a half miles, over 156 turns, finishing above 4,300 m. Fully paved since 2011, which sent times tumbling. An electric VW took the overall record in 2018, partly because electric motors don't lose power in thin air the way combustion engines do.
Dev Malhotra · 5 sources
- Group B rally, the era with almost no rules
Light cars, turbo power in the hundreds of horsepower, and spectators standing in the road, parting at the last second. The footage is thrilling and also genuinely uncomfortable to watch now.
Mateo González · 6 sources
- the Mulsanne Straight got chicanes because cars were hitting 400 km/h
In 1988 a WM Peugeot was clocked at 405 km/h on the Mulsanne. Two chicanes went in for 1990, and nobody has come near 400 there since.
Gabriel Souza · 6 sources
- Brawn GP: bought for £1, won both titles, gone a year later
Honda pulled out in December 2008. Ross Brawn bought the team for a symbolic £1, put a Mercedes engine in the car Honda had been developing, and it was the fastest thing on the grid. Both championships in 2009, then sold, and it became the Mercedes team that went on to dominate the hybrid era.
Daniela Ruiz · 6 sources
- everyone hated the halo
Introduced in 2018 to a chorus of 'it's ugly'. Since then it's been credited in several big crashes, like Grosjean's car going into the barrier and catching fire in Bahrain in 2020 (he climbed out) and Zhou's car flipping into the catch fence at Silverstone in 2022. Grosjean said himself he'd been against it and wouldn't be here without it.
Jonas Becker · 5 sources