Tilke plans changes to Mexico City F1 track

F1 Fanatic Round-up

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In the round-up: Hermann Tilke’s company is planning alterations to the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City which is tipped to host a round of the world championship next year.

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New Jersey likely to drop off 2014 calendar (Adam Cooper’s F1 Blog)

“Charlie Whiting and a Tilke representative visited the Mexico City venue recently and plans for revisions to the track – including moving the famous esses towards the infield to create more run-off – are in hand. The promoters also want to build a new pit complex.”

Vettel should not be booed – Hamilton (BBC)

“No-one should be booed for their success, no matter how easy or hard it has been for them to get there.”

Lewis Hamilton claims he wouldn’t want to win in the same way as Sebastian Vettel following his cruise to Singapore victory

“I tried to imagine what it would be like if I was winning races the way he is winning races. Me, I don’t want to be able to be that far ahead, I want to be able to fight with him or whoever.”

Christian Horner Q&A (Sky)

“I just don’t think it’s sporting at the end of the day to see a driver who’s put in a performance like that not get the reception that he deserves. Of course he says it doesn’t affect him, he doesn’t feel it, but he’s a human being at the end of the day and when you’ve driven your heart out and you’re given that reaction up there to me it’s not fair. I don’t think it’s sporting, I don’t think it’s right and I don’t think it’s deserved in any way.”

FIA to advise against F1 driver lifts (Autosport)

“Drivers are set to be recommended not to risk future punishments for offering such lifts.”

Todt’s ‘jump start’ of FIA Election race should incur penalty claims Ward (David Ward and Team)

“At the very least it would be in the best interest of the FIA if all the support letters signed before 6th September now be revoked. By declaring them to be null and void, all the clubs involved would be released from any obligation they feel they may have unwittingly made before the election process had officially begun. The FIA membership can then engage in the election process transparently, without prior commitment, and make their choice based on a fair comparison of the candidates and their respective manifestos.”

Mercedes ‘not depressed’ over Vettel

Mercedes executive director Toro Wolff: “If you look at the race, immediately afterwards we were disappointed to finish third and fourth, but then you return to your hotel and say ‘Well, that was fine’.”

Andretti vs Mansell (MotorSport)

Jim McGee, Newman/Haas’s team manager 1993-94: “Mansell was such a showman. He was a magnet for the press and I think Mario thought the press should have been paying more attention to him in his last few years. Another thing was Mansell was very generous with the team. He gave them bonus money in cash and that really pissed Mario off.”

Access All Areas – Composites (Mercedes via YouTube)

Fernando Alonso’s bid for cycling team Euskaltel Euskadi fails (The Herald Sun)

“The negotiations between Euskaltel and the representatives of Fernando Alonso for the acquisition of the cycling team Euskaltel Euskadi on behalf of the Asturian driver, which began with an agreement in principle on August 31, have ended without an agreement.”

Tweets

Comment of the day

Becken wonders whether unrealistic expectations at the root of the booing of Vettel:

Maybe what is happening is that those booing are, subconsciously, a protesting for what F1 people (including media) sold for them for years: a drivers’ championship.

Vettel’s domination is a team effort and should be perceived like that.

So, for some who are condemning the audience, don’t blame the uneducated crowd for feeling frustrated, but those ones who always manipulated the fans’ perception of the sport.

As an aside, I’d like to remember Vettel at the Autosport Awards telling some good and funny jokes and, I have to confess: it is hard not to like him, or not to think he is a great kid with a well-liked character.

So, I feel for him, mainly for him being the target of fans’ frustration towards F1 and for the incompetence of the teams that those fans support.
Becken

From the forum

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Christian Mateus and Selidor!

If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is by emailling me, using Twitter or adding to the list here.

On this day in F1

Stirling Moss won the non-championship Gold Cup race at Oulton Park in a Lotus 18 today in 1961. He shared the front row of the grid with Jim Clark – also in a Lotus 18 – but the future champion retired after colliding with Brian Naylor.

Image © Ford

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109 comments on “Tilke plans changes to Mexico City F1 track”

  1. OmarR-Pepper (@)
    24th September 2013, 0:05

    Oh no!!! The track will be punk’d… I’m sorry, Tilke’d

    1. @omarr-pepper – Maybe not. If Tilke can reprofile the Esses, and slow down the exit speed, then maybe the Peraltada could be kept intact.

    2. Called it when news broke of Tilke people going to Mexico. And I am reposting this: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=6080944

      1. So true. The old Mexican track and Tilke are like water and fire. Mexico has round, sweeping corners, Tilke favours geometric shapes, hairpins, straights and chicanes…

      2. @npf1 Where did you get that shape from? I hope it’s just a joke, not an official layout.

        1. It’s a joke. I made it when it was first announced some of Tilke’s men were going to Mexico.

      3. No way. They can’t kill that “parabolica” and the “esses”. If they do that, they will be disrespecting the authors of the original design.

      4. From the horse’s mouth:

        http://d3j5vwomefv46c.cloudfront.net/photos/large/810747659.jpg?1379985261

        Last of the esses looks good. Although it’ll probably be a Neweymobile 1-2.

        1. @faulty If I’m seeing this right, it appears they’re gonna halve the peraltada and have a makeshift chicane that cuts through the baseball field like champ car used? If so, that’s saddening, but I wasn’t expecting to see the full peraltada in use anyway…

          1. It’s unknown, source of the image (Fox Sports pundit, Luis Manuel López) says that the problem area for the Tilke people is how to join the stadium back to where the peraltada was, as the latest version used a terrible chicane-thing that intersected at the middle. If you remember from its CART and A1 days, it gave people on the western end of the main straight no chance to watch the cars.

            Problem’s under the dorito’s sign.

            I think it’s reasonable to assume that because of its 26,000 seat capacity the stadium will be part of the layout, no sane promoter would skip it for nostalgia’s sake. So i guess that it becomes a matter of how the last of the esses connects to the oval straight and how much of this storage area can be moved/cut

    3. I think there’s not much left to ruin on the Hermanos Rodriguez, anyway.

      I feel like the original track had four points of interest. These were the decreasing radius T1 with the switchback to T2, the heavily banked slow hairpin up the road before where the Esses begin, the Esses themselves and the Peraltada.

      The old T1 and the hairpin are gone and let’s face it: they would never allow cars to take the slightly banked 180-degree turn of Peraltada in full swing without wiping out a street on the outside of it for the largest run-off area the world has ever seen. And the latter is probably an unrealistic prospect as well.

      That leaves us the Esses in their original nature, which was one of gradual opening-up, each curve being a tad faster than the previous one – mind you, the original concept, indeed drawn by Tavo Hellmund and not Tilke, of the COTA featured a similar nature for the esses in S1, it’s just that Tilke re-drawn portions of the track, made the last two tighter, and I heard Sky and driver last year noting that that last sequence of the esses makes it impossible to follow the other car into the next hairpin and onto the long backstraight. So, back to the Hermanos Rodriguez, OK, the Esses is still there, but arguably the three other main features mentioned were more interesting, so it’s not that big of a loss if the Esses will be modified. The main damage was done way earlier.

      1. Have to agree – there’s a lot of wishful thinking going on when F1 plans to return to a venue last used 22 years before. I hadn’t considered the Esses needing any work, although I have a vague memory of a nasty crash on the exit of the last one, when someone hit a wall close to the track at speed.

        It’ll just be another track on the historic site of a great circuit, like the Nurburgring, Hockenheim, the Red Bull Ring (which isn’t a patch on the original), and arguably Silverstone or Monza.

      2. Why would the peraltada be a problem? They don’t need run off area, they need a wall on the outside. They do it all the time in indycar and this turn will probably be easily flatout anyway.

  2. Me, I don’t want to be able to be that far ahead

    Hmmm, not sure I believe you, Lewis!

    1. Yeah. I don’t really understand what he’s getting at. I’m sure Vettel is highly satisfied with his last three wins. Maybe it’s a subtle dig at Vettel being in such a good car? Alonso has had a go at Vettel’s machinery a few times in the past as well, maybe Lewis is doing the same.

      1. @mike-dee @colossal-squid
        I think you’re giving Hamilton too much credit, I’d just take his words at face value.

        1. but that IS face-value. otherwise it would mean that HAM implies VET should slow down to fight with the competition more closely. and that’s preposterous.

      2. @colossal-squid

        Seb is in fantastic form and we cannot deny how superior that car is now in Seb’s hand because Mark is nowhere close. I saw how easy he got past Lewis at Spa (in loco) and the ways he got away last Sunday… He was easting kerbs without losing balance, great traction, easy on tyres…

        1. I completely agree with you. A super driver in a super car leads to dominance. It’s interesting to see how Mark Webber has done this season compared to Vettel. He’s not as good as Vettel but he’s not a million miles off either. I guess it shows how small the margin is between a very good driver and a brilliant one.

    2. I think he means he would rather win having had a good battle with another driver than just romp around the track unchallenged, but I’m equally sure he would rather romp around the track unchallenged than lose a good battle.

      1. I think you’re entirely wrong about that last bit. I do not know of, nor have I ever heard of a sportsman who simply wants to win by the largest margin possible (other than certain individuals who don’t care about the sport, just about being the best, and people idolize that sort of mentality sometimes).

        At any rate, a race distance in an intense, respectful battle with a great opponent is a far better feeling than utter domination. I think Vettel is fine with utter domination, same with a certain previous German but I’m 100% convinced Hamilton is one of the individuals who lives for competition. There is NO competition in winning by half a minute.

        1. I do not know of, nor have I ever heard of a sportsman who simply wants to win by the largest margin possible

          Then you’ve seen very little of professional sports.

          Or you believe everything PR says. Not a good thing.

        2. They try to do a good job making a fast car. They show up to the race, and nobody else has. You say that Vettel is fine with utter domination, but do you really think Hamilton would just lift and coast in the same situation? Sure, maybe if he had his choice, he’d prefer a close fight. But do you really think he’d lift and coast given the fastest car?

        3. Complete bull. Hamilton has dominated Grands Prix in the past and never looked unhappy about it. Look at Silverstone 2008. Hamilton won with over one minute ahead of the next guy. In other interviews he’s said that’s one of his career highlights and happiest moments.

    3. So Vettel puts in one drive that blows away the field and then some. Suddenly it is a trend. What about the races this year when he won by around a second. No driver said that’s the way they like to win. A win is a win and sportsman would rather the gap be large than small. A small gap might turn into 2nd place due to a slight error, a large gap gives you a buffer just incase something happens.

    4. I get his point. Personally, I think Seb himself would’ve enjoy more if it was closer.

      I’m not a pro, but when my friends and I race in karts, we like to have even cars because it’s more fun.

    5. I believe that Hamilton means what he says. He is the guy with the most natural talent on the grid, but also quite naive. He likes competition and is a racer but sometimes I’ve the feeling his head is in the clouds, romanticizing the whole approach of becoming a champion and not really understanding what it takes.
      It worked for him in 2008 – but frankly I’d put my money on ALO and VET to win championships – these guys know that the best way to beat the odds is leave nothing to chance. And have the biggest possible advantage over your competitors because you never know how long it will last. That’s the reason ALO has been 3 times the runner up in the RB/VET era.

    6. I always felt the often repeated stereotype of Hamilton being a true racer rings somewhat true, he really enjoys racing and beating others on track more than driving a solid race.

      Vettel races much more to beat himself. He doesn’t get as much enjoyment out of combat and spectacle, but personal perfection.

      1. W (@yesyesyesandyesagain)
        24th September 2013, 16:20

        Vettel definitely seems like more of a numbers guy, he would be happy racing around an empty track trying to beat his own times. Winning by thirty seconds probably doesn’t matter to Vettel as much as getting the fastest lap, pole and win; if doing so happens to net him a huge margin of victory he could care less.

        1. On the one hand I do get that beating someone in a close battle is rewarding, but I agree with many here that if it was LH dominating, it’s not like he’d be depressed about it, or would back off for the sake of fighting it out with someone. I don’t think those that spend the millions upon millions to field his car would appreciate it either. So it’s a romantic notion, but I have to agree with those who are implying LH might be just taking a small jab at the ‘cakewalk’ SV is making this seem.

          I think in a small way LH saying this about SV’s runaway, is booing him, even though in this same roundup he is telling BBC he doesn’t think SV should be booed.

          What will interest me is to see then if he will ever accept a number one role at Mercedes which many seem to assume is the case just because he has more wins and a WDC on his CV, and currently more points, over Rosberg. So if LH truly relishes ‘the battle’ then I fully expect it will only ever be apples to apples between him and NR at Mercedes. Surely he wouldn’t accept a number one role.

  3. If I was Seb I would be paying people to boo me, he gets more sympathetic publicity from being booed than he gets for setting records.

    1. Tifosis are allowed to boo whoever they want. They even booed Alonso (and they will in the near future).
      If he is a grown man and a triple WDC…he should be able to take it.
      It just a boo.

      1. I agree, that’s reality. What’s annoying is the questions Seb gets: are the boos giving you booboos inside awwwwww… and he’s on cloud n.9, he doesn’t give a hoot imo.

      2. @mumito

        If he is a grown man and a triple WDC…he should be able to take it.

        I don’t doubt that Vettel has the capacity to overcome the boorish conduct of a few loudmouthed louts. But that doesn’t excuse their behaviour in the first place.

        1. “Excuse their behavior”? This is not Wimbledon right before a serve, this is an F1 podium. If the fans are a little upset that the same driver has been winning every race for 4 years, let them boo. It happens in many sports, and we deal with it because without fans sports would not exist. I think F1 is so sensitive to it because there’s only really one point during the entire weekend when they get true crowd interaction and it’s being ruined here. But let’s not forget that athletes in football, basketball and baseball constantly endure far, far worse while actually playing their sports. This can go as far as racial taunts, and rarely takes 4 years of domination to come about. I agree with you, @keithcollantine, that there’s a line for fan behavior but I think booing at an F1 podium doesn’t even come close to it.

          On a somewhat unrelated note, if I were Vettel (which would be nice) it would be much more upsetting to me to hear backhanded comments from my peers, like Hamilton’s implying that I’m only winning because of my car, than it would be to hear some boos from fans.

      3. @mumito

        Tifosis are allowed to boo whoever they want.

        Oh sure. They are allowed alright. And we are allowed to call them immature, bitter haters because of that.

        1. Exactly. But you are taking things too far my friend. They are not haters. Ther are booers.
          The very same that booed were the ones that praised him with his Toro Rosso victory.
          A boo is not an insult. Its a boo.
          A boo is not a physical aggresion.
          Should we all love VET?

          1. Well, it’s a verbal aggression. It’s disrespectful, it’s rude, it’s immature and it makes the sport look bad when the winner is booed during his podium ceremony.

            Notice that no one is calling for a penalty for these people. We don’t want to see them jailed, fined or punished in any way, but shaming them is a fair game.

    2. It’s humorous to think the hate for Vettel is actually turning haters into sympathetic supporters haha

    3. I doubt the boos have much to do about being nice. Kimi is not that nice, but in my book, he’s the most popular driver in F1 these days.

      1. Well, it’s how things go these days… Kobe Bryant (BasketBall player) had never been so popular when he was faced with rape allegations…

  4. Tilke again? Nowadays you have two kind of circuits: GOOD ONES (Spa, Monza, Buenos Aires, Interlagos, Suzuka) and BAD ONES (India, Korea, Hungaroring, Valencia). Why can’t F1 mimic old european circuits? Portugal, Imola…
    A circuit is a big part of a race. Boring circuits lead to tire-gate, and a lot of interventions….let’s just run.

    1. Mimicking history will only get F1 so far before people complain again.
      Also I noticed you didn’t list the Circuit of the Americas in the good list, which is a tilkedome, and as far as I can tell it’s a well received circuit.

      1. He didn’t list COTA in the bad circuits, either. Is it not a circuit? It’s neither good nor bad and only those two exist…

      2. @bosley Tilke build it but it wasn’t designed by him, mind.

        He did well at some places tho. Sepang and Istambul stand out. I also like the modification at the Nurburgring. But the Abu Dhabis and the Valencias balance it out, or even make the whole of his designs look very bad. Abu Dhabi is a particularly bad example… I still can’t work out how, from a clean sheet that was that desserted island, they managed to design chicanes and limited run off areas…

        1. @fer-no65

          I’m picturing Tilke carving out chicanes in a massive sheet cake, maybe drawing a course through a pan of brownies, making a ginger bread pit lane… in that desserted island.

          In all seriousness, I agree with you – Sepang and Istanbul are great circuits but his work, on the whole, leaves a lot to be desired.

          I’m always surprised that F1 isn’t more interested in adding range to their circuits – recruiting a range of designers to design tracks which are different.

      3. Tilke didn’t design CoTA, he just did the Engineering work and made it happen. Tavo Hellmund with help from Kevin Schwantz did the actual layout of the course. I love the track, it’s my home course, I live here.

        1. I was there last year. Really boring circuit. Just 1 place to overtake (where Lewis overtook Seb). It was such a big thing because of America, but I don’t like it as a circuit.

      4. @bosley I believe Webber and Alonso or KOB or someone didn’t like it all that much.

    2. Tilke can get right sometimes, I adore COTA.

      1. Maybe because he didn’t have much to do with the shape of the track. It was conceived by Tavo Hellmund and Kevin Schwantz. Tilke assisted them and his company did a good job designing all the facilities around the track, but the layout isn’t his.

        1. So that’s the secret! @maroonjack

          But Turkey is OK though

    3. I don’t understand why Tilke got such a bad reputation – Abu Dhabi, Valencia are street circuits – also South Korea was designed to be a street circuit (at least sector 3) – how would you build them?

      The other tracks, Sepang, Istanbul, Shanghai, India, COTA, Bahrain (track good / race bad) are actually good additions to the calendar. Which gives us a nice mix between traditional tracks and new ones. Also you shouldn’t forget that these days tracks are build for multiple series with different safety requirements and other multi-purpose features – so considering all that Tilke didn’t do a bad job – he was certainly not perfect and deserves definitely some criticism, but I would give him the benefit of a doubt before trashing his next project.

      1. Abu Dhabi is totally NOT a street circuit, it’s a purpose-built track that tries really hard to mimic Monaco in more than one respect, but fails miserably in all of them.

        1. That’s what I was saying they were all designed to be street circuits including Abu Dhabi – not that they were on streets but the owner wanted it that way – so it’s not like Tilke can do as he pleases – he works within a given set of parameters and considering that – he isn’t too bad.

    4. Than how is it circuits like Spa and Monza produced boring dull races this year?

      With all that history these races should be producing amazing races.

      Go look at the ratings of these races. Not what you want it to be.

    5. Why can’t F1 mimic old european circuits?

      Because it creates half of the problems fans associate with Tilke tracks.

      Take Korea as an example, one complex at the beginning of the middle sector is a bit akin to Maggots and Becketts although it doesn’t have the same feeling and character as the latter. Korea is almost computerised the way I see the cars change directions in the high-speed corners.

      India and Hungaroring aren’t bad tracks if not good tracks. For India, the drivers have had good things to say about it recently, it’s relatively fast but at the same time has fluency, fluency that the aforementioned Korea lacks.

      Boring circuits lead to tire-gate

      Remind me, which track staged our last “tire-gate”?

  5. Lewis is yet again implying that he would’nt want to win “like that” because this is all machine and not man, while if he fights; that’s because he makes the difference as the “better driver”. More insinuation that Seb is all about the car’s incredible advantage. That aside, not sure I believe he’s that much the mightier driver as his performances lately leaves you wondering…

    1. I think you have it right. If that’s the subtext to Hamilton’s comments then it’s either petty or some kind of psychological warfare. I’m guessing the latter, competitors as strong and Hamilton and Alonso know how to play mind games to their advantage, but I think Vettel might be too strong to be affected by it!

    2. Sometimes I think Lewis just says things for what they sound like more than what he actually thinks.

      1. While I think he’s obsessed with comparing himself to other drivers, and this obsession is what brings out the dramatic self criticism when he underperforms. It’s not all black and white is how he needs to look at it…

    3. @makana

      I don’t know if he implied that Seb is all machinery, he pointed that he deserves credit, but deny that his car was much better than Ferrari, Mercedes or Lotus is fool.

      1. @jcost @sid90 Seb’s car might be the fastest these days (don’t forget Nico was 0.09 secs behind in Q3 and I assume if Lewis had his setup right or whatever he would’ve had a shot at it) but Merc is no slouch of a car. At the end of the day the RB9 is the fastest; OK but my point is that Lewis never misses the chances to point out that “it’s the car”; if he watches Seb on board, it’s like the German is cruising compared to drives taking the car to the limit (he said that in an interview 2 days ago)… And when he gets beaten by his teammate, his demeanor afterwards is pathetic; he’s about to cry, he’s sad and unresponsive, like a little boy! And that’s what I mean by his obsession to argue that if anyone is beating him it’s because of machinery – unless Nico does it, then he’s got answers like setup and settling in, except lately he couldn’t mention those; his mechanics would probably know it’s not the case.
        Yes he duly congratulated Seb and that’s great, but to be honest I think Seb’s psyche is made of steel, even if no one congratulated him he’d be back in that car and destroying the timesheets. My concern with Lewis is that he would be a much better driver if he flew back to Earth from time to time and realized that Hey, some other drivers are frickin’ fast! It’s Not only the car and Newey and bla bla bla, then he’d probably learn much more and win much more, no one denies he’s got the raw talent to annihilate the field… but raw oil from the ground is no use to an engine.

        1. A bitter comment from Lewis. Saddly, these just become too regular. I was a fan of him, but he has disappointed me too much in these last few years.

          I would have loved to see him hard working and concentrated as Vettel. Vettel’s comments when crossing the chequered flag reveal the true character, leadership and team spirit of him. Lewis has the most raw talent of everyone in the field. As a fan of his driving style, It just becomes much more disappointing seeing all this potential wasted. Yes he is doing well enough, but he is far from being worthy of a Champion, or legend status… The clock is ticking. Maybe Mercedes do come up with a dominating car soon. But by these comments, by this attitude, I don’t see him succeed.

        2. @makana, @sergio-perez

          I really think you guys are making too much a fuss out of it. Did he say anything you consider untrue? Vettel is very fast but his car is great aid to deliver. Period.

          Some can argue Hamilton and Alonso say that to diminish Vettel’s achievements, but on the other hand I cannot ignore that Seb has got the best car, and in many occasions ridiculously dominant car, since second half of 2009 season!

          He has got some challenging GPs this year and years before, but in many occasions it was too easy and having a sharply better car in 20-25% of the races every year might be enough to land titles, just ask Button or Schumacher (who’s my fave driver, by the way).

          Then, some will ask where’s Mark Webber in this? His last performances are just showing how superior Vettel is to him, and Webber is above average. That fact shows there’s more than Newey in Vettel wins but the same way we cannot take his credit, we must give credit to the engineers and designers behind his success.

          Pretty much every WDC wins in the best car, if not the best at least second best but second best can’t beat the best if it’s one full second slower in a single lap, in 25% of the races.

          Sour grapes Lewis? Maybe but he has a point. And as I’ve said before, I think Seb himself would enjoy more winning highly contested GPs than half a minute ahead while managing his tyres and conserving his gear box.

  6. I will be happy to see the FIA ban driver lifts providing they send an official car around behind the field, as in the formation lap, to pick up any stranded drivers.

    1. They already do. Max Chilton drives it! (sorry, Max)

      1. COTD right there

  7. Todd (@braketurnaccelerate)
    24th September 2013, 0:45

    Mercedes executive director Toro Wolff: “If you look at the race, immediately afterwards we were disappointed to finish third and fourth, but then you return to your hotel and say ‘Well, that was fine’.”

    Third and Fourth? Is that how teams are looking at it now? When Red Bull (Vettel) wins, they just see it as 2nd place being the real 1st?

    1. The formula1 official webpage had a heading describing Alonso’s “win” :D

      1. @neiana I saw that and thought it was an article about 2008!

    2. @braketurnaccelerate Ron Dennis said something about 2nd being 1st of the losers. Then again, given where McLaren are this year… they’d be more than happy to be 1st of the losers right now.

      1. @journeyer I bet he was saying that in 1988…

    3. @braketurnaccelerate

      Third and Fourth? Is that how teams are looking at it now?

      Maybe it’s taken out of context and Wolfff was reminiscing the Belgian Grand Prix? Look at the picture accompanying the article.

  8. There are 2 esses.

    Turns 9, 10 & 11 and Turns 12 &13 are both called the Esses according to wikipedia (Unless they are all the “Esses”)

    If he is moving turns 12 &13 then that could mean a slower exit speed on to the straight entering Peraltada which means we would be able to have the full corner.

    1. @zantkiller – The big problem with moving Turn 12 and Turn 13 is that the infield is limited to begin with, and the pits and paddock further constrain the area. But the Mexicans also want a new pit building and paddock area, so if they were moved entirely, it would be possible to reshape the Esses and slow the cars down for the full Peraltada.

      1. I think a new paddock area is planned further down the main straight past the oval, there’s a couple of football fields now, so I don’t think it’ll be much of a problem to build there.

  9. Very good COTD. I think I have said this before on a number of occassions over the last couple years. F1 is a team sport, but people dont understand that. Red Bull win because they have the best team, not because the have the best driver or the best car, its because they have all elements required to succeed. You can’t plonk Lionel Messi at Sunderland and expect them to win the Premiership.

    Its up to the rest to catch up. The likes of Merc, Ferrari and Mclaren have pockets as deep as Red Bull, hence it isnt a money thing..they just arent good enough. As much as I would like to see the championship go down to the final race, Red Bull deserve every success as they’ve earned it. The performance in Singapore was nothing short crushing, at 2 seconds a lap quicker, he looked like he could have eeked out more time if it was required.

    Congrats to Red Bull and Vettel for winning their 4th Championships in a row. You’ve got to be bloody good to achieve that in a sport as competitive Formula 1.

    1. Very true, one look at McLaren should be all that is necessarry to understand how difficult this sort of domination is to achieve, meanwhile Mercedes, Ferrari and Lotus are providing a fascinating season fighting for best of the rest.

    2. @jaymenon10 Precisely ! It’s the complete package . Even if one part of it is missing , the whole thing goes awry.

  10. I wonder how the altitude of Mexico City (~2200m) will affect the new turbo engines, engineers must not be too pleased with a changing calendar every other week, anyway just a few more days for the “final” version.

    1. Probably not much…they can tune the ECU to suit the mixture. I doubt this will be an issue.

      1. I’m not so sure about that, I read somewhere that at Interlagos the current V8 engines lose about 30 horsepower, and that’s at an altitude of only 800m! They’re gonna lose alot more than that at 2200m, and knowing the FIA I don’t think they’ll allow much ECU tuning to compensate for it. Oh well, it just means that once F1 gets to Mexico, they’ll not only be slower than the GP2 cars, but slower than the GP3 cars as well. Love the direction F1 is heading.

        1. At least it will be in November when it should, in theory, be cooler and therefore have a much greater oxygen density.

  11. “I tried to imagine what it would be like if I was winning races the way he is winning races. Me, I don’t want to be able to be that far ahead, I want to be able to fight with him or whoever.”

    I’ll just try not to laugh…

    So Lewis want his team to do a not good enough job over the competition? or does he want to not develop the car as much so people can catch him and fight for position?

    Does he enjoy sitting on pole and winning from lights to flag? by the sound of it, not very much. He’d rather finish second? doubt it…

    Give-me-a-break, Hami ! You’d love to be in that Red Bull !

    1. @fer-no65 He want’s a good race and not a borefest served for us every Sunday. I think I can relate to that .

      If you feel that every driver does not think of winning when the lights go green , then your logic is flawed . Even Max Chilton loves to win . Maybe Lewis likes to have some good fair fights when he wins to feel satisfied of a victory . That , is his personal perspective .

      1. *wants .

        That is the most ridiculous typo I have made on f1f . My coffee isn’t strong enough …pchh

  12. I know that any talk of altering the Mexico city circuit will cause an uproar but in all honesty as I said when it was announced it does need to be upgraded & the esses was one section I pointed out.

    The esses are very fast & there is not much run-off there with a concrete wall right there & very high kurbs ready to launch a car if someone runs off. Something does need to be done there to add a bit more run-off to be able to put tyres or tek-pro barriers infront of the concrete walls & the kurbs do need lowering.

    Also lets not over-react, There only talking about moving the corners inwards to create more run-off. They can do that while keeping the actual profile of the corner (And therefore also corner speed) as it was in its original location.

  13. If Tilke is being recruited to bring the circuit up to scratch with FIA safety regulations, then great. Better that than no race at all. But if he’s going to add a mile-long straight and replace the esses with hairpins, then no. Please be careful, Hermann…

    1. There’s nothing to suggest that he’s going to tear up the Esses and replace them with a straight. He’s just going to tweak them a bit to get more space for run-off.

    2. I agree, I actually like the fact that the circuit is simple in its design (main straight, esses and Peraltada) it may not see the most overtakes of the season or even be the most challenging technically speaking for the drivers, but it definitely has a soul and character that can’t be had in the newer tracks, doesn’t matter how much money they spend to make them.

      1. Don’t you think they are starting this awfully late? It’s almost October and the race is pencilled in for 13 month’s time. All this and a ‘new pit complex’ too in just over a year.

        1. A state of the art new pit complex can be built in 8-9 months as long as there’s money and workforce. It’s tight, but possible.

  14. I have to admit that I did shudder when I read “Tilke plans changes to Mexico City F1 track”. He’s come up with a few cracking designs in his time (Sepang and Austin leap to mind), but I still don’t associate his name with exceptional F1 circuits.

  15. Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez will be disfigured by Hermann Tilke

  16. Great article from Motorsports. Nigel Mansell was used to be my F1 hero, I was too young to understand why that Williams was so dominant, for me it was all him. I like his driving and his regular guy look, what a character.

  17. Hamilton is being so disingenuous and untruthful when he says: I don’t wanna win like that! Seriously, have we ever seen him after a dominant win (and a dominant win inevitably is supported by the car’s pace or the opposition being eliminated) to say: “ah that wasn’t fun, I wish those guys were closer and gave me a harder time, try more next time boys”??

    No, if he wins by a big margin he and the media see him as Ayrton’s second coming.

    Furthermore, if he doesn’t care about winning with the car why does he constantly bitch that Sebastian has had the best car for the past 4.5 years(which is not even true! His McLaren was faster most of the races and this year Ferrari and lotus had a better race pace in the start if the season)?? Moreover, why did he went to Red Bull garage after Canada 2011 GP and begged to get a seat there for next year if he doesn’t want the supposedly “dominant” car?

    Hamilton (like Alonso) are desperately trying to say that they are some sort of victim here because they have supposedly inferior cars and thus Seb’s wins and titles are worthless. And he is completely ignoring that some of Seb’s win like Germany was achieved with car and through hard battle with two faster Lotuses.

    Nevertheless, it is commendable that he is condemning the jeering. This has no place in a sport esp. When the winner has done no offense.

    One more thing: if ignoring a team order deserves booing, people should have been boing Weeber since Silvestone 2011 and then reinforce it after Brazil 2012). Besides, there are drivers who have done worse things to gain an advantage far worse than ignoring team order: for instance, Hamilton LIED to Stewards in Australia and was disqualified when his lie was discovered. Let me put this in perspective: lying to stewards is the equivalent of lying to investigators for personal gain in real life which gets you a prison sentence. Defying your boss’ order will reault in a disciplinary procedure which at worse gets you fired (or a slap on the wrist if that’s what your colleague has received for the same offense)

    1. Wow @ifelix.

      I though Lewis said some pretty obvious stuff: Seb is great driver who deserves credit, but we cannot ignore his car was far better than opposition at Singapore (or since Spa, to be honest). He didn’t even said Seb likes it, he jsut said he would not enjoy. Did you ask Seb if he’d rather have closer battles? Probably his opinion is similar to Lewis’, it’s not Seb’s fault that his car is better and Lewis certainly did not say he would slow down his car to have a race…

  18. Posting a nice link to a video made by a viewer who had the Webber pickup happen right in front of him – link to my post in the article about that

  19. In order to keep the Peraltada as it is, they could add soft-walls, like the ones they use on Nascar ovals.

    Mexico city is an outstanding track: Tilke will slaughter it, like he did with every track he touched (Hockenheim, Fuji, Spielberg, etc…). I suggest we create a Facebook page to support the track and prevent as much as we can Tilke from killing it.

  20. From the hamilton article:

    “I look at his laps on the on-board camera and it doesn’t appear as though he is on the limit like some other drivers.
    “When you have that much in hand it makes it that much easier to do so. At the end of the day he does the job he needs to do.

    I always wondered to what extend this is actually true. Webber appears to be far more on ‘the limit’ based on his more flamboyant on board laps, yet he is consistently outqualified. Of course, theoretically the back stepping out and flying over curbs isn’t actually on the limit, it’s slightly over it…

    1. Michael Brown (@)
      24th September 2013, 19:34

      Vettel droves a lot smoother which is going to do his tires better than Webber

  21. On, off, on, off. I hope the final calendar is released soon so the New Jersey debate can be put to bed either way (mind if it is on it, there’s still no guarantee that it will host the race).

  22. Great Motorsport article as always. Really love that mag. Ahhh, our dear Nige at Laguna! the memories!

  23. I sincerely hope that Tilke doesn’t ruin the track like they did with the Champ cars. The Oval T1 and T2 would make a great corner for the current F1 cars.

  24. I am sure they can get the construction all done by race weekend. Which I am happy that Mexico will be revived for 2014. I reckon Kyalami should get a slot for 2015.

  25. Really looking forward for this race! I´m already planning on driving there next year! It´ll be some 2,147 km to drive for me but, I´ll more than gladly drive them! It´ll be a nice road trip with the missus and my little queen! Finally they will get to feel what I felt in Barcelona 2011! I have even picked out the hotel! I just need the calendar to be official to book it!

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