(Motorsport-Total.com) – Lando Norris caused a stir after the Formula 1 race in Japan with a statement: Are the drivers no longer masters of their machines? This was suggested by the world champion, who said he didn’t want to overtake Lewis Hamilton at one point during the race, but because the battery continued to release energy against his will, he was virtually forced into the maneuver.
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McLaren team principal Andrea Stella tries to explain the situation surrounding his protégé, who had overtaken Hamilton in the final chicane but was then swallowed up by him again on the following straight due to an empty battery.
The problem is that the drivers don’t have enough energy to be fast on all the straights. “So you basically have to choose when you want to attack or defend,” Stella explains. In McLaren’s case, the best time to attack Ferrari on Sunday was actually between the Spoon curve and the chicane.
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“If you press the boost button there, you get an extension of the MGU-K deployment. That consumes a lot of energy,” says the Italian. However, this also significantly increases the approach speed towards 130R. “We’re talking about 340 km/h, and at 340 km/h, 130R is no longer a full-throttle matter,” says Stella.
“So you don’t just lift because you want to charge the battery, but you lift because you would otherwise have a stability problem. Lifting in 130R is therefore not just related to energy management, but is a grip-related limitation.”
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Only: if you get back on the gas after lifting, the regulations force you to use the electric motor again. “That means you have to strain your battery even further,” says Stella. “And that very likely leads to the battery running out after the chicane, even if you have completed the overtaking maneuver.”
That is exactly why Norris was then overtaken again on the start-finish straight. But Stella thinks that the regulations could put a stop to this issue.
“You could allow the engineers to choose track sections themselves where no electric motor is switched on after lifting when accelerating again. This would give more freedom in the way the battery is used,” he says.
“I think otherwise you end up in situations like Lando’s, who overtook Hamilton a few times and was immediately overtaken back. I believe there would be the possibility to give the drivers and engineers more leeway here.”
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