Michael Schumacher is not making a come back. When I heard the news I really didn’t know whether to be happy or sad about it. In spite of being a great fan of Schumi, I really didn’t want him to come back, because of the reasons I’ve mentioned in one of my posts (refer ‘Schumi is back?!’). The latest news is that test driver Luca Badoer is taking the wheel for Ferrari. I just hope Ferrari lives up to its name.
Recently, when I was talking about Formula One with one of my friends, he ridiculed by saying that anybody could drive a car and it definitely is not a great sport like Cricket, Soccer or Tennis. So for those of you who think that driving a Formula One car is easy, I’m posting some facts about this great sport. Mind you, it is the most dangerous and risky sport that ever is and it requires tremendous skill and will power to drive it.
o F1 car is made up of 80,000 components, if it were assembled 99.9% correctly; it would still start the Race with 80 things wrong!
o When a F1 driver hits the brakes on his car he experiences retardation or deceleration comparable to a regular car driving through a BRICK wall at 300kmph!
o F1 car can go from 0 to 160 kph AND back to 0 in FOUR seconds!
o F1 car engines last only for about 2 hours of racing mostly before blowing up on the other hand we expect our engines to last us for a decent 20yrs on an average and they quite faithfully DO....that’s the extent to which the engines are pushed to perform.
o An average F1 driver looses about 4kgs of weight after just one race due to the prolonged exposure to high g-forces and temperatures for little over an hour and a half. He experiences up to 5 G (Yeah that’s right!!).
o The temperature inside the cockpit of Formula One car can reach well over 50 degree C. Now imagine yourself sitting inside a pressure cooker for over an hour and a half.
o At 550kg a F1 car is less than half the weight of a Mini.
o To give you an idea of just how important aerodynamic design and added down force can be, small planes can take off at slower speeds than F1 cars travel on the track.
o Without aerodynamic down force, high-performance racing cars have sufficient power to produce wheel spin and loss of control at 160 kph. They usually race at over 300 kph.
o In a street course race like the
o The cars can be refueled at 12 liters per second. The rig used would take just 4 seconds to fill the tank of an average 50 litre family cars. They use the same refueling rigs used on US military helicopters today.
o During the race the Tyres lose weight! Each tyre loses about 0.5 kg in weight due to wear.
o Normal tyres last 60 000 - 100 000 km. Racing tyres are designed to last 90 - 120 km.
o A dry-weather F1 tyre reaches peak operating performance (best 20grip) when tread temperature is between 900C and 1200C. (Water boils at 100C remember) At top speed, F1 tyres rotate 50 times a second.
o A Formula One driver’s heart beats 170 times per minute while driving. (Race goes on for an hour and a half)
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This is the punishment a F1 driver goes through. It is not just about driving skills, but also it requires lots of guts and a very high level of concentration. Every second counts. Apart from these, danger always lurks on the tracks. One of the best racers of all times, Ayrton Senna died on the track in the early 90s. Now, after reading this, if you still think that Formula One is an easy and mindless sport, you better think again!
