Formula 1: The vital dance of 2 second attitude

In Formula 1 there are several critical circumstances during a Grand Prix that affect its effect.

One of them is what happens during the pit stops, which, if done correctly, is a ballistic screen of engineering.

The regulations dictate that each driver should perform two tire compounds during a large prix, and this makes the pit stops – in which all four tires must be changed. Teams often have to choose from the soft, medium and hard compounds offered by Pirelli, the tire supplier for the sport and the surveillance conditions and the weather factor to whom they will use.

“You don’t win a match in a pit stop,” said Rich Wolverson, head of Red Bull racing business business, “but you lose a match with a bad pit.”

Red Bull was the fastest and most consistent Pit-Stop crew last season, with it McLaren had the fastest atomic time of 1.9 seconds.

McLaren holds the record in Formula 1 in 1.8 seconds in the Grand Prix of Qatar 2023, but there is a balance to be hit.

“There is a fine line between credibility and performance, taking this balance,” Wolverson said. “You don’t want to push everyone to get a world record every weekend, because there are mistakes there, you just want consistent attitudes that give the driver the confidence that he can maintain his place on the track.”

Red Bull aims at an average of 2.2 seconds Pit-Stop, which it considers as the compromise between the pursuit of final performance without risking a mistake that started.

“You have to be consistent,” Chris Gent, the team’s lead engineer, said in an interview. “If you have good once and then one bad next time, the strategy [team] You have some numbers and if they are missing from these goals, it will cost them for the breed strategy, so you have to be consistent in timetables. ”

Each group has a specified point, called a box, in the lane. Therefore, the order to fly over a driver’s radio is “box, box, box”. The gearbox is usually slightly angular, as it is faster and easier for drivers to brake than the Pit Strip speed limit about 50 miles per hour at a shallow corner and then accelerate to a more acute slope.

The attitude of the pit usually includes about 22 people, with some as a backup. Two hold the center of the car for stability, while two more lift the car to jacks. The front plug rotates sideways, accelerating the reduction process.

There are also three people per wheel, with one to remove the tire, which weighs about 22 kg, one to place the new tire and another to operate a device called the gun. This removes the wheel nut in the first move and puts the walnut back in the next move.

A traffic light on a crane over the driver – controlled by the gent – tells the driver when to go.

“There are a lot of people,” Wolverson said, and getting every person to make their role perfectly “is very rare”.

Ghent must know not only Red Bull’s attitude but also for other cars that enter and leaving the strip. If any car is released on the path of another car, not only is in danger of colliding, but will be sentenced to five seconds.

There will always be errors, including wheel failures, adhesive wheel nuts, and the tires intended for a driver’s teammate, as well as loose wheels. The reaction quickly to these failures is fundamental.

“It’s crucial, because the next car could come,” Wolverson said. “I can see what’s going on, and whether it’s a technical or a human issue, because the control software is safe, so if it’s safe, the car will be stuck there.

In 2021, Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas was forced to retire from the Monaco Grand Prix when a wheel nut was damaged and could not be removed during a stop. The car had to be sent to the factory with the tire still mounted before the walnut eventually broke. Technically, the attitude of the pit took almost two days.

Pit-stop times have also evolved.

“I’ve been involved for 19 years,” Gent said, noting that the equipment has changed significantly. And since 2010, cars are no longer refueling during the races.

“We had refueling, so you are talking about a 10 -second stop, changing the tires didn’t worry because I always expected fuel,” he said. “There were no quick release jacks as you don’t need them.”

The Formula 1 administrative body, the FIA, regulates the pit equipment to avoid spiral costs, while teams are also conscious of where it is best to spend their money to achieve the best results.

“Now we have reached a point where they are plots in terms of equipment,” Wolverson said to spend money on equipment. “He is now in the cost lid now, so he balances the profits there in relation to what we would spend in the car.”

This means that the 1.8 -second record will be difficult to overcome.

“You’re trying to go even faster. You’ll probably introduce errors, so I can’t see it to be much faster, to be honest,” Gent said.

Early in the morning at the Grands Prix, the sound of firearms is stable as the teams exercise pit stops, with the car slowly pushing into the box for engineering. The teams also exercise with older cars in their factories.

“We probably make 30 stops throughout the event event in practice and live during the meeting, with a live car,” Wolverson said. This is especially important at the beginning of each year to train any new engineering.

“It’s about building their trust with a live car,” Wolverson said. “We can do a lot in the factory but nothing reproduces the adrenaline of a living car coming to you. We only have a group of people to choose from.