Pros and cons of penalties
ENGINE ‘DOES NOTHING FOR F1’: CALLS TO USE FIVE, RATHER THAN THE THREE UNITS NEXT SEASON
Championship can be settled due to penalties rather than driving ability.
Formula One’s engine penalties that turned the grid upside down at Monza has again initiating heated discussion. Most experts decry the system and claim it is damaging the image of F1.
The concept, in the name of cost cutting, also appears to elicit varied responses from the teams.
Christian Horner of Red Bull is not happy with the system, whereas Haas F1 team principal Guenther Steiner agrees with it.
Horner said: “This engine has done nothing for F1 since it was introduced.
“What concerns me is that we are going to three engines for next year with more races. That should be number one on the agenda at the next strategy meeting, I tried to get it changed earlier in the year but there was no support.”
He agrees that some form of penalty is required to keep costs down, but questions if it really reduced costs.
“The grid penalties are a deterrent but how many times have we seen drivers come from the back of the grid and grabbing a very useful haul of points?
“So how does this reduce costs and what does it do for the middle to back of the field teams? “Penalties apply to them as well, but a loss of even one point can make a big difference to them, not just in overall championship position but at the end of season payments.
“A loss due to engine penalties could be disastrous. The battle between Manor and Sauber last year is a case in point,” he said.
Horner has called for the return to last season’s allocation of five units rather than the three unit maximum coming into effect in 2018.
I have to agree with the Red Bull chief in this situation.
If power unit limits are reduced and the number of races increased it will almost certainly result in the Drivers’ Championship being settled due to penalties rather than driving ability.
Steiner believes that the engine penalties were introduced for a “good reason” and that was to have cost control.
He stated that the big teams, on receiving a minor grid penalty, will opt to change more items and slip further down the grid, which is good for the smaller teams.
The idea is sound but what difference will this really make to the non factory teams?
Those “works” cars and drivers are always quicker and will always take scoring opportunities for the smaller budget players.
What decision the next Strategy Group meeting will arrive at is anyone’s guess and it will be interesting to gauge how much self interest still prevails.
I reckon we will not hear of any groundbreaking changes.
Regarding the penalties, I shall herewith endeavour to explain them as simply as possible.
The regulations specify that teams are only allowed four power units per season and one gearbox for six consecutive events.
This sounds simple but it is not as straightforward as it appears, since a power unit is a conglomerate of component parts.
Each power unit is composed of six elements – an Internal Combustion Engine (ICE), a Motor Generator Unit – Heat (MGU-H), a Motor Generator Unit –Kinetic (MGU-K), a Turbo Charger (TC), an Energy Store (ES) and the Control Electronics (CE).
The MGU–H and MGU-K are the units that effectively replace the earlier system known as Kinetic Energy Recovery (KERS), the two MGU’s are there to harvest energy.
So, each element of that assembly is subject to penalty. Every car is allowed a maximum of four each of those elements – beyond that the regulations kick in.
Let us assume that a team has used four MGU-H units and during practice another fails. That would be number five and therefore in excess of the allowance.
As it is the first time the team has exceeded the limit a ten grid position penalty will be applied – the remaining elements if they fail, are subject to a five position penalty.
But, should a sixth MGU-H be required then it restarts with a ten-place penalty and thereafter a five position penalty.
During any single event, if a driver introduces more than one of a power unit element that is subject to a grid penalty, only the last element fitted may be used at subsequent events without further penalty.
Every unscheduled gearbox change results in a five place drop on the grid at that meeting. So, that is all cleared up, then. Not really. It is a massively convoluted system, impossible to describe in simple terms.
This weekend Singapore hosts round 14 of the championship – a circuit that has not favoured the Mercedes team in previous years.
But with Lewis Hamilton on a roll and Sebastien Vettel apparently unperturbed by Ferrari’s loss at Monza and believing the fight for the title is not over yet, it has got to be worth watching.