Radio instructions to driver.

[sportsman]

http://argent.fia.com/web/fia-publi...LE/1-2012 SPORTING REGULATIONS 09-03-2012.pdf
20) DRIVING
20.1 The driver must drive the car alone and unaided.

This is something that has always puzzled me.During the race its not unusual for the team to advise their drivers X will pit in two laps time or Y can run to to the end of the race or similair.
Driver X is faster than you push push or similair instructions.Other information such as your brakes are overheating and harvest 14% KERS this lap and various other information.The list is endless with constant weather updates to the driver as to the likelyhood of rain in the X number of laps or rain will stop in next few minutes.
If that is not aiding the driver what is it.Possibly the brake information might have safety aspects but the other information is solely to aid the driver.

 

[Senna's_right_foot]

To me, 'driving' means steering, braking and accelerating. I don't think info given to the driver about how fast to go or when to pit etc changes that, the driver still has to make the physical inputs.
edit - I think it's referring to any control of the car being activated from the pits. However, with driving aids such as ABS and Traction Control being banned as driver aids, surely power steering falls under this too? Although this could be excused on safety grounds I suppose.

 

[Galahad]

I suppose the ability to filter out the relevant information from what seems to be a fair quantity of idle chit-chat is one test of a different driving skill. More akin to real world driving, particularly if one's mother-in-law is on the back seat (I digress).

Those who would ban radio, would you ban pit boards too? And if so, would drivers need to count down the laps themselves? Plus, what do you do about the steering-wheel-mounted displays?

 

[The Artist.....]

Personally, I would just ban car to pit telemetry. The teams could make a decision about what the key information they need to know about, and make a display on the dashboard of these figures, which if they need, the driver could either relay them, or they could download them when they return to the pit! I always think it's madness that the team can look at a whole pile of figures and tell the driver precisely what they need to do!

 

[Blog Zbod]

There's a laundry list of automotive technologies that are banned from F1 on the grounds it relieves the driver of some of the burden of operating the car. Like traction control, ABS and the automatic gear changer, to name but three. But they allow the race engineer, by means of two-way radio communications, to remove from the driver a substantial portion of the intellectual burden that used to be part and parcel to a winning driver's racecraft.

I understand why they do it, as there undoubtedly is a net cost savings to the teams by being able to tell a driver he has an abnormal indication and must retire (or pit) before he does the engine a mischief. And it sometimes can enable a driver to nurse a crippled car to the finish, as was the case with Vettel last year at Interlagos. But the FIA's mantra increasingly seems to be, "Bugger the competition, save the cash!" I have no doubt whatsoever that the course of events in any given race would play out far differently if it weren't for the driver's wet nurse who sits on the pit wall, spoon-feeding them detailed car management parameters.

I don't begrudge the teams their telemetry, just access to "live" data during the race.

 

[Speshal]

You see this can of worms?

"Fernano, is faster, than, you"

 

[Mezzer]

sportsman Meh, half of that information could be on the pit boards (as it used to be), I don't have a problem with it. I think its pretty clear that the reg is referring to the actual operation of the car and goes back to the days where the engineers in the garage could make adjustments remotely. I remember reading a conspiracy article many moons ago that suggested that Piquet had been deliberately induced into a spin by an engineer's 'tweak' when he was leading a quicker Mansell. No idea if it was true, of course, but clearly the type of interference (positive or negative) that the reg is trying to ensure can't occur.

 

[Blog Zbod]

The driver can't ask questions of the pit board, he only gets to read it once each lap, and just how many line of instructions do you expect you can you retain from having read a 2 foot by 2 foot sign you're just driven past at 180 feet per second?

 

[sportsman]

Mezzer
How much more can you get on here that the driver can see and remember in the few seconds he has to read it. Also this one from 1964.Has to be a link as its copyright.
http://www.heritage-images.com/Preview/PreviewPage.aspx?id=1633863&pricing=true&licenseType=RM

 

[jez101]

I think there are legitimate cost saving reasons for the telemetry. If teams can now see when an engine or gearbox is about to go pop, they can stop the car before the explosion causes a much more expensive incident.

 

[no-FIAt-please]

I have no problem with pit-to-car radio. Part of F1 is about technology and innovation, this would simply be another case banning technology and for no good reason.

Aiding a driver in my eyes is to help him steer, brake and accelerate. Not to give him information, because it's up to the driver whether he wants to use that information, which may or may not be correct in the first place.

 

[Mezzer]

sportsman Actually you can absorb a lot of information in a split second. Note that I say absorb, not read. You see the information for a very short period and then process it afterwards, its something I've done many times myself. That said, clearly a radio can pass on far more detailed information far quicker, that's not in dispute. As I have already said, though, its my opinion, and apparently others, that the regulation that you started this thread on is aimed at not having external forces directly affecting the car, i.e. by over-the-air tweaks.

 

[sportsman]

I interpret that regulation slightly differently to simply telemetery.Yes regarding "over the air tweaks" that is banned and telemetery is one way only.
My understanding of the word unaided means without any external assistance "of any kind".The driver races his own race without his team informing him of other drivers times, when they are due to pit and what tyres they using.
That kind of information is in my eyes "aid" or external assistance.Without it the driver would have to make his own decisions as to how he manages his race not safe in the knowledge that no one else can catch him, or conversely another driver is catching him and he needs to respond.
Pit boards are fine.But you only see them once every lap unlike radio instructions which can be at any time during the race.

 

[the_roadie]

Actually you can absorb a lot of information in a split second. Note that I say absorb, not read.

I remember many years ago when I think it was Graham Hill said that when racing your concentration is such that you can spot a man up in the stands reading a newspaper, and on the next lap you can notice if he's turned the page.
The human brain can process vast amounts of visual and audible and sensory data at a phenomenal rate, and react to it before conscious thought has kicked in.
Pick up a book and read a page. How long does it take you? Three minutes? Two? 90 seconds? Very good!
Try reading the whole page completely in 5 seconds, yes 5 seconds. I learned to do it 40 years ago. It's a knack but very simply it involves letting your eyes and brain do the reading without conscious thought getting in the way.
How else could a driver operate 30 buttons on an F1 wheel plus drive the car plus feel how it's handling plus race split seconds apart from other drivers at 200mph plus chat to the race engineer over the radio plus run, re-evaluate and update his own tactics and strategies? Certainly impossible if conscious thought was involved in everything.

My understanding of the word unaided means without any external assistance "of any kind".The driver races his own race without his team informing him of other drivers times, when they are due to pit and what tyres they using.
That kind of information is in my eyes "aid" or external assistance.

Surely remarks from a pit to a driver - which we hear on the TV coverage throughout every race - about who else is on which tyres and how long they've been on them and how long they should last before the other man needs to pit, and what the drivers around him are doing, show that to be that even though that's what you'd rightly think the rules mean, that interpretation is incorrect?
A driver is therefore actually being directly "externally-aided" all the time by radio with information that is not available to him from his own cockpit during the race.
?

 

[The Artist.....]

To me, there is a difference between a team giving the driver information about what all the others drivers are doing (which is what anyone can observe) and telling the drivers about the intricacies of the car - such as the fuel settings, etc etc... As such, I still advocate getting rid of the telemetry! Let drivers decide what information is important, and have that readout in the car! The drivers did it in the 1980s with the fuel readout... They can do it again!

 

[the_roadie]

The Artist.....

pushing against an open door here - three pedals, one wheel, one gearstick, no buttons !

 

[Bill Boddy]

One wheel? You mean speedboats? And no Jenson?