Home · Sports · Oct 6 archive
The 'weird' car theory sparked by F1 pecking order surprises
Developing
In Short: Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies admitted the results were a 'surprise,' noting that extreme heat, track roughness, and layout pushed most cars out of their ideal operating conditions.
Stella added that McLaren's car operated as expected in terms of downforce and mechanical grip, but the team was still puzzled by its performance in high-speed corners compared to recent races.
Mekies also pointed out that the combination of updates, track temperature, and track surface created behaviors that made drivers struggle in slow corners.
The Race reported that Mercedes fears George Russell could face a 'double whammy' grid drop after his Sepang DNF, adding to the complexity of assessing team performance.
Stella said McLaren would observe the car's upgrades and relative competitiveness in the upcoming Singapore Grand Prix before making final race decisions.
What's still developing
- Among the factors potentially behind a swing in Formula 1's recent pecking order in Malaysia is how an extreme track surface could have made some cars behave in a "weird way" aerodynamically.
- Even Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies admitted this was a "surprise".
- "I think your pointing is not inaccurate."
- Mekies said the extreme heat, track roughness and layout of the track meant "most of the cars out there were out of their ideal operating window".
- Stella offered an intriguing hint at why this could be the case when he said: "There's some conditions, even the Tarmac conditions, they make the car operate in a weird way, not only from a tyre's point of view."
- "The combination potentially of updates, track temperature and track surface caused an interaction, a set of behaviours that meant the car was not in its usual happy state, that the drivers were having to turn the car on the throttle in the slow corners," said Lord.
- There's a big upgrade question mark for Mercedes to solve - here's what we know All the times you need to know for Formula 1's next race - the 2026 Singapore Grand Prix Mercedes fears George Russell could get a “double whammy” grid drop after his Sepang DNF Here's what we learned from F1's first Sepang weekend in nine years On the latest episode of The Race F1 Podcast, Edd Straw is joined by Jon Noble and Scott Mitchell-Malm to discuss the Malaysia-hosted Bahrain GP Wet weather, tyre choices, software bug chaos and safety cars make assessing the Sepang field against their circumstances all the more critical.
- Meanwhile, McLaren team principal Andrea Stella was "puzzled a little bit" why its prowess in high-speed corners from recent races in Madrid or Zandvoort - the latter also utilising older asphalt - was not evident in Malaysia.
- "That was further exacerbating the challenges of tyre temperatures. So that's not an easy thing to unpick."
Sources
- The Racelink