Carlton Supporters Club

How Alonso walked away from that is a modern miracle.

It's a shame poor old Senna missed out on these technical advances.

I used to love F1 but it's dead to me now, it's no longer racing.

I still love it, its just super technical these days compared to even 5-10 years ago. A mate of mine spoke to a Red Bull engineer at the GP the first year the new turbo/electric power units where used. The engineer told him these things are off the planet in terms of performance, might not sound the best but are insane.
I was watching qualifying on Sat and they showed in car of Lewis during a lap. Not only was he going flat knacker on a quali lap, he was constantly adjusting brake bias via steering wheel buttons between most corners. I must commend the FIA, they are always trying to limit team or technology input to the driver. Now they have limited what they can tell the driver over radio comms. I'm sure the teams will get around it the shifty buggers. But I under how many have dropped off F1, its not everyone's cup of tea any more.

I don't mind the quiet cars and technology as long as there is racing. The "formula" part of F1 barely exists anymore, contrast racing in F1 with racing in other categories there is no comparison. Even Hamilton was recently quoted as stating F1 is boring.

Senna had the right idea years ago, remove most of the technology and leave it up to driver skills, then you get racing. Soon they will be able to replace the F1 drivers with robots and you will barely notice a difference!

In any case F1 is no longer the regime for the worlds best drivers, because you only get a drive if you can bring $50M~$100M to the team plus sponsors.

I recall at Bathhurst there was a drive off between Button and Lowndes, a modified F1 car and a touring car with drivers swapping. After a few laps Lowndes was within 0.3s of Button, after just as many laps in the touring car Button was still 7s adrift of Lowndes time. It was very diplomatically reported!

Reminds me of when some celebs on Top Gear almost match times with F1 drivers, hard to believe but it happens.

OK, last line first. They never compete in the same cars, so not sure where you have drawn that comparison.

Button vs Lowndes...
Was unaware of that ever happening, but i reckon that says more about the bathurst track than anything else.
Put the same cars at Monaco and Lowndes wouldn't be able to finish a lap in the F1 car.

re Senna...
Courtesy of his death, there was a real shift to make the sport safer....and it worked.
Up until last year with the delayed death of Jules Bianchi, nobody had died since Senna in an unparalled improvement in the sport.

It's wishful thinking about Lowndes and drivers of his ilk not being able to lap Monarco.

Has Button ever seen Bathurst before?

It doesn't explain 7 seconds, especially after both drivers had practice sessions..

FYI, Lowndes actually offered the same excuse for Button to the media, but behind the scenes sentiment was very different.  I know this because I have business associates who drive, engineer and manage one of the major domestic teams. Two of them spent almost a decade in F1 as part of a race crew. One was a chief engineer and the other a pit manager. As much as I appreciate your simulator experience I think I'll trust their opinion.

It doesn't explain 7 seconds? BS.

You mentioned Top gear in an earlier post.
Go back and watch the episode involving the nurburgring (well, one of a couple).
How much time does everyone shave off their times after their first times around there?
Once you get to know the track, time starts falling off.
Lowndes, if he is like most aussie drivers, has grown up watching bathurst his whole life and knows every inch of the track. You don't think thats worth 7 seconds compared to someone who has never even seen it? Keep in mind there is very little runoff areas to help you if something goes wrong.

BTW, Buttons driving style is somewhat conservative, easy on the tyres. Not used to throwing cars around like the V8 drivers

If your not using a car that sits so high off the ground, then you could easily lose that time.


The F1's downforces glue them to the track which make them handle much better than a V8.

There are your 7 seconds.

Lowndes would have found it easier driving the F1 car, than a V8 in the same way that a distance runner could run a sprint.

Get the sprinter to run distance and watch them fail.

That doesnt mean either is inferior superior, its simply a matter of what you get used to.

So where did the 7s go, if you are claiming down force was an issue it means the straights are out of the consideration, so now those 7s must have been across the top, so that becomes 7s out of what say 50s? It's an even bigger difference, you've made it look even worse for Button!

Keep in mind the F1 car they drove was modified to allow running at Bathurst, it was raised, so it had lower down force yet the driver lap times nearly matched.

The sprint / distance analogy is irrelevant.

The people I know were shocked at the timings, they would have had access to splits that are not available in the public 3 sector timings. They were very diplomatic because one of their major sponsors was one of Buttons sponsors and the sponsor had arranged the whole gig.