This was not written by me, although I WISH I experienced what Rich did. Just
forwared by me.
Enjoy.
A report by someone that experienced Formula 1 racing, like most will never
experience in their entire life.
If you love racing, you'll love this report.
Lee Darzycki
Red '93 300ZX Twin Turbo
http://www.clubz.org/cgi-bin/member/LeeDarzycki.asp
---------------------- Forwarded by: Lee Darzycki/APPLIED MATERIALS on 9/25/2000
7:34:08 AM ----------------------
Merritt <merritt@cedar-rapids.net> on 09/25/2000 04:00:03 AM
Please respond to opentracking@topica.com
To: stealth@starnet.net, opentracking@topica.com, Team3S@stealth-3000gt.st
cc: (bcc: Lee Darzycki/APPLIED MATERIALS)
Subject: OpnTrk: Formula 1 Report -- Very Long
I just got back from the F1 race in Indianapolis. It was a walk on the wild
side.
First, let me say that I am no one important. A very good friend was kind
enough to invite me along as a guest of Siemens, who is a "technology
partner" (sponsor) on the West McLaren team. Because of this, I got to
experience F1 from the inside.
I felt the same as I do when we are at Road America -- I expect a janitor
to step out of a building and yell, "Hey! What are you guys doing here?"
Here, I expected someone from F1 to say: "Excuse me sir, but you are not
worthy enough."
If you watched the race, you undoubtedly saw the new F1 garages behind the
pits. Atop the garages are the hospitality suites. West McLaren had leased
almost the entire top section to host at least five separate suites for its
sponsors, including Mobil 1, Sun computer, Computer Associates, Siemens and
SAP. I was in there, amongst the movers and shakers and VIP guests. Siemens
brought 135 such guests from all over the world. In all, West McLaren
entertained about 900 people for the weekend.
You've seen shots of people milling around the hot pits before a race, I'm
sure. That's called the "Pit Walkabout" and the only people permitted there
are guests of the teams. You cannot buy a pit pass at the track. So those
thousands of people you see -- from the leggy blonde bimbo babes to the
corporate VIPs are all guests of somebody's team or sponsor.
Running a top F1 team costs $200 million per year. Both Ferarri and West
McLaren have this kind of money to spend, while other teams spend
considerably less -- as you can tell by their relative performance compared
to the two top teams.
West McLaren has 26 sponsors, ranging from the biggies such as West
(European cigarettes), Hugo Boss (clothing and cosmetics), Mobil 1 and
SAP, to the smaller sponsors, such as Siemens. If you are a West McLaren
fan, you are probably scratching your head, saying "Siemens? I don't
remember seeing a Siemens logo on the car." The amount of money you put
into the program determines if you get a logo on the car, and where it
goes. Siemens has a tiny Siemens Fujitsu logo on the edge of the right
front wing, and a logo on Mika Hakkinen's uniform. This is because they
probably only put a mere $15-25 million into the program (just a guess,
mind you), which isn't enough for an on-car logo.
F1 is high technology gone berserk. Watch carefully next time you see them
start an F1 engine. It takes two Siemens Fujitsu laptop computers -- one
for the engine and one for the chassis -- to start them up. That's why you
never see an F1 car push-started, and why the driver simply abandons it if
the car stalls on the track. It can't be restarted without being taken back
to the pits and hooked up to the computers.
Each car has a data acquisition system that senses about 200 variables,
encompassing just about everything you can imagine, from cylinder
temperatures to exhaust composition to sideslip acceleration. This data is
transmitted from the cars to transponders located at intervals all the way
around a circuit, back to the Sun computers in the pits. West McClaren goes
one step farther than most: Using Siemens communications equipment (another
plug for my Siemens friends), they transmit the real-time data via
satellite back to McLaren headquarters in England, where 100 engineers
monitor every variable in real time. If they spot an anomaly, they can
communicate directly with the crew chief over the satellite.
In F1, cars are new every year. Last year's cars go to the museums, and
every team starts over from scratch. The cars are designed, modeled and
simulated in CAD systems, and then every one of the 10,000+ parts has to be
made by hand. Some work gets contracted out to specialty race fabricators
in and around Woking, England, but McClaren has complete machine tool and
fabrication facilities of its own. McClaren builds almost 100% of the
parts, with the exception of the engines, which come from Mercedes/Ilmore
(originally Roger Penske's Chevy small block motors).
The technology involved represents the state of the art in every aspect:
materials science (carbon fiber), on-board computers and electronics, CAD
design, computer modeling and simulation, wind tunnel testing,
communications and so on.
Throughout the race weekend, we were treated to live presentations by a
teddibly clever pair of commentators -- one in the suites and one in the
garage. Using large screen TVs in the suites and its own TV cameras and
race feeds, West McLaren kept up us informed about everything that was
happening on a regular basis.
As an example, we got to hear the incredible sound of the 7-speed gear box
being tested in the garage - with the car off the ground, the mechanic revs
the motor up to some insane rpm and then shifts the car through the entire
range, up and down. The tranny shifts gears in 25 milliseconds, so it
sounds something like this: Waaaaa aaaaaaa aaaaa aaaaa aaaaa aaaaa aaaaa.
Unbelievable. The engines generate about 850 hp on pump gasoline and rev to
16,500 rpm. 0-60 takes 2 sec, 0-100 is 5 sec.
At Indy, they were under full throttle for 22 seconds nonstop, the longest
in F1, and reached 200+ mph before braking for turn 1. David Coulthard
told us that turn 1 made him feel like a real race driver.
Oh yes, the drivers came and talked to us. They knew they were talking to
SPONSORS, the folks who put up the $200 million that lets them go so fast,
so they did their standup routines very well. Coulthard is very funny and
forthright, while Mika Hakkinen is much like you see on TV during the
interviews. To Mika's credit, he was more personable with us than he is on TV.
Sounds like I was buddy-buddy with Dave and Mike, doesn't it? Actually, I
only got within 10 ft of Coulthard, along with 900 other people, so we
didn't have a conversation.
The hospitality during the race and Friday and Saturday nights was
everything you imagine. It was like being in a Hollywood movie. Try to
picture what it would be like to be entertained trackside by the top F1
team in the world -- it was all that and more! We were treated to
wonderful food, excellent wine, and superb entertainment morning, noon and
night. We got racing shirts, jackets, hats, wristwatches, throwaway
cameras, Hugo Boss gifts sets, and commerative tea cups. The producer of
the Friday night entertainment (including performers from Circ du Solei in
Paris) told me that West McLaren had put the extravaganza together in the
hopes of making F1 more understandable and enjoyable for its sponsors in
the US, so that the sport will grow here.
(In my humble opinion, F1 won't take off here until there is an American
driver in the ranks, and they change the wings and aerodynamics so that
passing is possible. But that's another topic)
For all the folks out there who run race teams (we have a TransAm team) and
treat their sponsors to hamburgers, hot dogs and brats under a hospitality
tent stretched between the transporters, let me say this: Man, F1 knows how
to treat sponsors right! West McLaren and Siemens probably spent more on
hospitality for this single event than we spend on our race cars for an
entire year.
Here's an example: On Saturday, it took an unacceptable amount of time to
get from our downtown hotel to the track for morning practice. Siemens had
rented 25 identical silver/gray minivans, and it took well over an hour to
go the five miles to the track on Saturday. So, on race day, Siemens hired
the county sheriff to give us an escort. Our caravan made it to INSIDE the
speedway, to the entrance to the paddock area, in 15 minutes. We never
stopped -- not for red lights, not for traffic, not for pedestrians. With
sirens blaring and lights flashing, the police took us into oncoming
traffic, around stopped cars at intersections, and through red lights, all
with the assistance of local police at each intersection. What a ride! I
have no idea what that cost, but I'll be it was not cheap.
That's all I can think of at 5:45 am.
Rich
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