Category Archives: Race Previews

Valencia Preview

Posted on May 3, 2016 | Leave a comment

The end of the SBMRL season is finally upon us with our final race to be held on the Valencia Street Circuit in Spain.  The circuit is situated around the harbor and is highlighted by a lengthy swing bridge in the second sector.  Valencia played host to Formula 1 for 5 years starting in 2008 before the league departed for good.

Valencia

Drivers start on the relatively short front straight, which will be a tremendous change from our last race in Russia.  Sochi had the longest run up to the first turn of any track to date.  The first corner, Principal 1, is tantalizingly close to the starting line and is fairly forgiving.  Drivers shouldn’t have to slow down too much to handle it, and those at the middle of the grid could take advantage of it to catch up with the front runners early on.  Those who hit it right will have no trouble flying right on to the second corner, Veles E Vents.  The distance between the two corners represents the only straight that can be fully realized in 4th gear.  Veles E Vents is the shortest 2-stop corner drivers will have to navigate this season, so it should see a fair amount of bunching early on.

The straight leading to Malvarrosa is long enough that it will tempt an aggressive approach, and Malvarrosa is long enough that it could work.  The problem is that Malvarrosa is also the most important turn to come out of at high speed, since it feeds into the track’s longest straight over the bridge.  This straight ends with the Nazaret turn, which is another 2-stop and, like Malvarrosa, a fairly long one.  Again, coming out at high speed for the following straight will be on the minds of drivers looking for an advantage.

The penultimate corner is Grao, an exceedingly long 3-stop corner that is the longest on the calendar this year.  Drivers will have a number of options in terms of what line to take, and there will be some good overtaking opportunities here.  A moderate length straight then leads to Principal 2, a sharp left hander that feeds back onto the starting grid.

The Valencia Street Circuit has the fewest number of designated corners with just 6 and boasts some very long multi-stop corners.  The challenge here will be the length of the straights between them, as it’ll be extremely rare for anyone to get up enough speed to take one at full throttle.  This should allow cars to pass each other regularly throughout the track, hopefully leading to a very exciting race.

Starting Grid

The starting grid was slated to be in order of team standings, with both cars from each team on their own row, but Ice suffers a 1-spot grid penalty for causing a crash last time out in Sochi, dropping him to 7th.  The front row is populated by Scandinavian Blitz, with the Stig taking over pole position from Mater, who had started there each of the last 3 races.

  1. The Stig (SB)
  2. Captain Slow (SB)
  3. Mater (GT)
  4. Danger Wheel (GT)
  5. Nero (CO)
  6. Launch Bornado (RM)
  7. Ice (CO)*
  8. Jaap Snellrijder (RM)

Pit selection is in the reverse order of team standings as they are reflected quite well in the starting grid:

  1. Regency Motors
  2. Cobalt
  3. Green Team
  4. Scandinavian Blitz

Final Race Outlook

While Jaap has locked up the driver’s championship, second place in the standings is completely up for grabs.  Launch and Ice have the best shot at it.  The two are separated by just a single point in the standings, which makes Ice’s grid penalty that much more frustrating.

At the bottom of the list, the Stig is out of the running for a top 3 finish in the standings this year, while Captain Slow still has an outside shot at it.  He could even finish as high as 2nd if he wins and the other contenders fall to the bottom of the pack.  Scandinavian Blitz has a similarly slim, but still possible, shot at finishing 2nd in the team standings.

In the middle, only 4 points lie between Nero, Danger Wheel, and Mater.  The hard charging Green Team is best situated to knock Cobalt out of the #2 position of the team standings, which they’ve held 5 of the 7 weeks this year, but they’ll have to perform well.  One expects that Nero with DNF’s each of the past two races, will either be extremely careful or throw caution to the wind in search of redemption.

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Russia Preview

Posted on April 7, 2016 | Leave a comment

Our penultimate race of the season brings us to the Olympic city of Sochi.  Having hosted the 2014 Winter Olympics, the Sochi Autodrom was first used for Formula 1 racing later that same year.

Sochi, Russia

The starting grid is located at the beginning of what is easily the longest straight on the track, and the run up to the first corner will be done at high speeds.  The straight is long enough that those at the back of the starting grid will have a chance to catch up with the front runners by hitting 5th gear.  The problem will be that they’ll have to hit Turn 1 just right.  Turn 1 is a short, sharp right hander that cars will have to hit in stride in order to set themselves up for the large, notable horseshoe turn.

The entire circuit is full of corners just like Turn 1.  After the horseshoe, there is a series of five of these sharp corners in quick succession.  None of these corners are conducive to staying in any particular gear.  How each driver manages their journey through this section will be one of the keys to the race.

Coming out of Turn 7, the other long straight on the track will allow drivers to open it up again.  Expect to see higher speeds entering the straight than exiting it, as it feeds into the only multi-stop turn on the track.  Turn 8  is winding and slow,  then gives way to a small straight section before running to the final two turns.  The last two turns are more of what was seen earlier, sharp 90-degree bends that would challenge drivers at higher speeds.  The difference here is that the slowdown from turn 8 will likely set up these two as nothing more than elementary since cars won’t be able to carry speed into them.

Overall, 8 of the 10 corners on the track are extremely short, meaning there will be a lot of opportunities for mistakes.  Expect these sharp bends to cause separation in the field relatively early in the race, but it won’t be before a highly entertaining run up to Turn 1 happens.  The other consequence will likely be heavy use of tires and braking.  Anyone who can manage to run a mostly clean first lap may find themselves with the luxury of forgoing the pits and really gunning it down the front straight.

STARTING GRID

Mater starts a 3rd consecutive race in pole position, but he’s closed the gap to the white liveried Scandinavian Blitz drivers.  Both Captain Slow and The Stig sit at 61 points on the year, but the Stig starts at P2 after finishing behind his teammate the last time out.  Danger Wheel follows next.  Despite crashing out early, Nero only drops down to 4th in the standings, which puts him at 5th on the grid.  Launch Bornado maintains an extremely small lead for 3rd place.  Ice’s runaway victory saw him jump all the way to 2nd in the standings, leaving him to start 7th.  Jaap gets a 6th consecutive race from the back of the pack after another strong race in Germany.

  1. Mater (GT)
  2. The Stig (SB)
  3. Captain Slow (SB)
  4. Danger Wheel (GT)
  5. Nero(CO)
  6. Launch Bornado (RM)
  7. Ice(CO)
  8. Jaap Snellrijder (RM)

Pit selection is simply the reverse order of average start position.  Since the Green Team and Scandinavian Blitz have the same average start position, the tie is broken by reverse order of team standings.  The Green Team has moved up to 3rd, so Scandinavian Blitz gets preference.

  1. Regency Motors
  2. Cobalt
  3. Scandinavian Blitz
  4. Green Team

The STretch Run

With Sochi being the second to last race of the year, there isn’t much time left for drivers at the bottom of the standings to catch up.  Mathematically speaking, everyone still has a shot at the driver’s championship, however it’s a bit more challenging for some than others.  Mater needs to finish no lower than 2nd in each of the final races to have any shot at winning the driver’s championship.  Captain Slow and the Stig are in equally precarious positions, needing at least a 4th place finish in both races.

It should be noted that Danger Wheel, currently 5th in the standings, is actually closer to 4th than 6th.  The largest points gap between drivers is 8 points between Ice (2nd) and Launch Bornado (3rd).  Launch has recently come under some criticism for failing to maintain the success from earlier in the year, although it should be noted that has come while staying high up in the standings.

Probably the biggest question is whether or not anyone can catch Jaap, who has been immune to just about any sort of trouble for most of the season.  Surely he has to have a bad race at some point.

Cobalt have won each of the last two races in runaway fashion, but no driver has won twice yet.  Mater and Launch are the two drivers without a victory.  If Mater does manage to earn what is now essentially a required win, he’ll maintain his streak of having never finished in the same spot twice.  He’s finished everywhere but 1st and 3rd.

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Germany Preview

Posted on March 3, 2016 | Leave a comment

March 11 brings the SBMRL to Germany for a tour around the Hockenheimring.  Originally built in 1932, the track was shortened in 2002 from 4.24 miles to the current configuration of 2.84 miles.  It was a significant alteration that was not welcome by traditionalists but insisted upon by racing governance bodies demanding a more accessible course for fans.  The new configuration of the course is what we’ll be running.

Hockenheim

Gone are the exceptionally long straights through German forest punctuated by chicanes.  Instead, the new track features hairpins and other slow corners which could result in more opportunities to catch the race leaders than we saw in Sebring due to lower overall speeds.

The first sector of this relatively short track opens with Nord Kurve, which despite a generous angle, will require drivers to navigate carefully.  There is a clear advantage to the cars at the start of the grid and a fast start from pole position could even see a car jump straight to it.  The cars at the back of the grid will be right up against the final turn of the track, a long way to go.

A short straight, albeit third longest of the course, leads to Bernie Ecclestone Kurve.  This corner will likely be the most frustrating simply because it prevents cars from gaining any sort of real speed before heading into Sector 2 and the longest straight on the track.

The long straight to the Spitzkehre hairpin will see the highest speeds on the track, but also the most braking at the end.  Spitzkehre is unforgiving and could see a fair amount of passing coming out of it, depending on who is able to maintain the most speed.  It feeds into the second longest straight on the track, but even that isn’t particularly long.  This isn’t Sebring by any means.  The sector wraps up with the Mercedes Arena corner, which is another challenging effort that’ll slow the field down for sector 3.

The third sector has the least amount of straight track and will be deceptively fast.  It opens with Mobil 1 Kurve which, given the slower entry into it, may not be as challenging as it could be.  The Sachs Kurve is more a U than a hairpin, and shouldn’t slow anyone down too much.  Finally, Sud Kurve is almost identical to Sebring’s Sunset Bend in execution but not in approach.  The low speed approach should mean that cars have very little trouble with it heading on to the front straight.

After the extreme frustration for most cars in Sebring, will we see a change of tactics for Hockenheim?  We are unlikely to see any car push their engine to the limits in 6th gear, rather, careful maximizing of time in the lower gears will be key.

Starting Grid

A disappointing showing in Florida leaves the Green Team locked in on the front row.  Mater will be the first driver to start multiple races in pole position.  Scandinavian Blitz, the only team to win multiple races this year takes row two to themselves.  Their Sebring performance was their worst since the opening race in Austin.  They can take comfort in knowing that they’ve performed well when starting higher up.  The back of the pack is familiar.  Nero took full advantage of starting in 3rd place in Sebring due to the tie breaker format and now finds himself starting in the familiar 7th slot.  He’s been there 3 times now.  Jaap starts his 5th consecutive race from the back of the pack amidst his smallest standings lead of the year.

  1. Mater (GT)
  2. Danger Wheel (GT)
  3. Captain Slow (SB)
  4. The Stig (SB)
  5. Ice (CO)
  6. Launch Bornado (RM)
  7. Nero (CO)
  8. Jaap Snellrijder (RM)

Pit selection is simply the reverse order of average start position, which is easy enough to figure this time around:

  1. Regency Motors
  2. Cobalt
  3. Scandinavian Blitz
  4. Green Team

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