F1 LEGEND TOUTS DOMINANCE OF MERCEDES ENGINES
Niki Lauda shares his thoughts on new teams, safety issues and extra races ahead of the new Formula One season
Formula One racing is the pinnacle of motorsport. It’s a costly and gruelling business involving thousands of designers, engineers, mechanics and drivers who will line up their cars this weekend for the Australian Grand Prix, the first race in the 2016 world championship season.
To find out what’s new, Wheels contributor Yvonne Marton spoke with three-time World Champion Niki Lauda, the current non-executive chairman of Mercedes F1 and owner of Lauda-Motion, a private air carrier.
The interview has been condensed and edited.
Will this season be louder and faster?
There have been some modifications on the exhaust systems of the engines, so it is louder — there’s no question about it. But if people compare these turbo hybrid engines to the old V8, they’re completely crazy because you cannot compare this. A turbocharged engine is less noisy than an aspirated normal engine but it is (now) louder and better.
Are lap speeds faster this year?
We are all trying to do a new car for 2018. The target was to have cars which look aggressive: wide tires, not retro but more different, and they have to go five seconds a lap quicker.
That program is on the way for 2018, but this year nothing has changed: the rules are the same, but the normal development, even if the rules are the same from one season to the other, is around half a second.
Mercedes, I have to say, we are, for the last two years, really the top-end engine, so our development can only be in one or two tenth (a second) on the engine side. The Renault, the Honda especially, and the Ferrari, they have much more room to move up. The speed we will only see after the first three races. One race like in Melbourne is not enough to identify how quick the Mercedes, the Ferrari or the Red Bull might be.
One of the changes is the additional head protection for the driver — they’ve been testing what’s called the “halo” prototype. I think there was also the half-canopy. Is there one design?
I think it is completely crazy if we make out of aggressive-looking Formula One cars these funny cars with head protection. There are a lot of discussions ongoing. The FIA says we have to protect the drivers because of the (Jules) Bianchi accident in Japan last year. This was a one-off very bad accident and unfortunately Bianchi lost his life. But not a normal accident when you run into a truck more or less.
We have to make sure that these Formula One cars are the last unique racing car where only the best people can show what they can do. If we continue only with safety thinking, we are going to destroy Formula One. The people won’t be interested in watching and for me this is the wrong direction.
And that seems to be a half-measure. If driver safety is the overriding concern than completely close it in.
Correct.
The season is longer this year. With 21 races, it’s the longest ever in Formula One. There’s the new addition of Baku, Azerbaijan, and the German GP is back in Hockenheim. What is the impact?
I think the ideal number is 19 to 20. But nevertheless when (Bernie) Ecclestone signs a new country and a new race he has to go there commercially and normally one race drops out and we are 19 or 20 races. But I think this might be a one-off. Twentyone I think we can handle it and we have to do it because the commercial rights holder is Ecclestone and he decides where we’re going.
There are also some new teams on the grid this year — what are your thoughts on Gene Haas’ new outfit?
It is an interesting experience how they started because they basically went to Ferrari, made a co-operation with Ferrari whereby they have the engine the gear box, whatever they need — they’re still a constructor which means the car they built themselves. They could use the Ferrari wind tunnel and now I don’t want to complain, I just want to say it was done very cleverly.
So the co-operation worked out, I think, in both directions (once) for Haas to get a good base to be in the middle field. I think they’ll be able to do that and for Ferrari could have found maybe one or two tenths with this close work. The FIA, I think in the beginning, did not look that close but I don’t want to complain about it — it was a clever move of Haas and Ferrari to do that.
They’ll be competitive, is what you’re saying.
I think they could end up midfield, which in the first season is very good.
Renault is still with Red Bull but are also fielding their own team by taking over Lotus — how will they do?
I think it’s very good that Renault are back. There’s no question about it for the whole sport. They bought Lotus and now they have a normal development time like Haas has, a little better because Lotus has some potential already in the past to move up. But it’s funny for me, a funny situation whereby Red Bull and Renault in the past, mainly, because Red Bull had a lot of problems in the working together relationship.
You’re very diplomatic on that point.
I can tell you they had so many fights complaining about each other they ended up in a mess like nobody believes.
And almost without an engine.
Yes, correct. And the outcome I find very funny now because Red Bull now has a Renault engine they call it the TAG Heuer engine. But now we’ll see logically that the Red Bull car will be quicker than the Renault car because the Red Bull car is by (Chief Technical Officer Adrian) Newey and they’re doing a fantastic job. (But) to me if the relationship is as it stands last year — I don’t think Renault talks much with Red Bull and I think this is the biggest mistake they can do. We had four cars running in Barcelona (for testing) all the same engine and if you work together with the engine people of my group with the other teams you can solve four times quicker engine problems than if you do it on your own.
Does that come down to personalities?
Correct. All the egos and personalities. And for me the surprise will be Toro Rosso with the Ferrari engine; even if it is 15th back, (it) could be a threat to Red Bull with the Renault engine.
Some new faces on the grid this year . . . what are they thinking as they take their place in Melbourne?
They go there with a mission to understand the car quickly like Haas, get the car working and see what is the outcome.
Some of the new drivers last year really punched above their weight and contributed some exciting driving.
Which was (Carlos) Sainz and (Max) Verstappen, no question.
Tires are always a big story. This year the Canadian GP will be purple themed — we’ll get the first use of the Pirelli P Zero Purple Ultra Soft. What do you have your eye on when it comes to tires?
There is a new tire rule where you can basically choose in field that you have a super soft tire available. The teams can do that so there is another set of tires which the teams can choose. The rules are written that not even I understand it and I doubt that anyone on the outside will understand this rule because the excitement they wanted to achieve, I think, will be pretty simple: you go to Melbourne and Bahrain and Shanghai and then you know the tires and their differences and then more of less everyone will do the same thing if they want to win races. So it’s another change I really don’t know if it’s positive. We have to watch it — I don’t think it is.
I’ve heard that the qualifying system has been settled.
Correct. They do it and the last one they change, thank God, that last 10 minutes is eight cars in the final round not 10. And they do it normal, the quickest is the quickest and the eighth is the eighth. Because if this had been a knockout again, which was the original plan, in the end only two cars would have driven which I think is ridiculous again. First we invented this so that more cars would be in the practice to watch on television or in the stands and then in the end we realized in the last 10 minutes that there would only be two cars there which is a joke. So anyway to find all these solutions is for me funny as it is for you and in the end, thank God, we found the right compromise.
One of the new things Ecclestone tried last year were “Grid Boys” (in Monaco and) Brazil. Will they be back this year?
(Laughing) I hope not! It’s ridiculous and it’s not only my opinion. (Sebastian) Vettel and the other guys could not understand (it).
Well, they tried something new.
Well, if they try something new I think they should find something better (laughing) and not go backwards.