18 April: San Marino Grand Prix Preview - Renault F1
Giancarlo
Fisichella
Looking at the Imola circuit, what are your expectations for the race? Imola is a selective circuit,
and I think it rewards a complete car that is strong in all areas: a comfortable chassis, strong engine and good tyres. The slow
corners mean you need good traction, and straights need aero efficiency and plenty of power, while there are quick corners as well
where you need a good chassis. You also need to be good over the kerbs, and the R25 is: it rides them well, and gives the drivers
enough confidence to really attack a lot. I think the car will be at ease there, and from a personal point of view, I have more
performance to find: I still need to work on finding a perfect balance so I can exploit the potential of the car. So far we have
been very strong and from my point of view, there is more to come.
How do you think your main rivals will perform in Imola? Looking
at the Michelin teams, Toyota have been our main competitors, and I am sure they will be strong: they have been good at two
different types of track now, so why not Imola? The other big concern for us is Ferrari. I think they will be very, very competitive
– we already saw that in Bahrain when Michael was close to Fernando. Now that they have had to time to develop the car, for sure
we will have a tough job to stay ahead.
Fernando Alonso
Fernando, as we begin the European season, what is
your verdict on the first three races? I think the team has started the season in a better way than we expected. Winter
testing showed us we could be competitive and get good results, so we went to Australia feeling very confident. But to win all three
races, with both drivers taking victories, and to have scored twenty-six points myself is a dream come true. The challenge now is to
maintain that level, and stay on top.
How have you had to adapt to the new regulations? Personally, I have not
changed anything compared to last year, and there are no big differences in how I approach the race weekend. The new rules have
forced us to adapt our way of working – we have to be careful with the engine, and as soon as we think it is possible to drop the
revs to protect the V10 and cool it more, then we do it. Equally on the tyre side, I have been able to get the maximum from the
Michelin tyres in qualifying on the single timed lap, but I have been quite conservative so far in the races – especially with the
rear tyres. In spite of that, we have been quick, and the Michelin tyres certainly make our life easier: their durability means it
has not been difficult to keep them in good condition.
You are first Spaniard to lead the World Championship – how does
that feel? I am enjoying the moment: I am leading the championship and have the best opportunity of my career to be in a
winning car, and celebrate each victory. When we talk about the championship, we should not do it based on the first three races –
it is the last three or four races of the season that will be the important ones I think. But having said that, I prefer to take the
points now and build a strong position from the start. We know it will be a long year, so I just want to continue enjoying myself,
and keep working as hard as I can.
Looking ahead to Imola, what will the demands be? Imola is a very tough circuit
for the suspension: we hit the kerbs hard, and the car needs to be able to cope with that. The drivers must be aggressive through
the corners, which I like, and it is impossible to relax: if you get the line wrong over the kerbs, you will be in the gravel trap
or the barrier. You also need to find good mechanical grip in the slow corners, traction on the exit and a strong engine down the
short straights. So far, the R25 has been competitive on all the types of circuit we have visited; I expect it will continue in San
Marino.
Rob White, Engine Technical Director
Three races into the 2005 season, can you explain how engine
usage has changed in 2005? Overall, the way we use the engines in 2005 is an evolution of how they were used in 2004 – but
the life cycle is now twice as long. The chassis and engine engineers agree how much running will be done before each weekend, and
in what conditions that will be done – usually in the week running up to the event. We then manage our programme according to
these decisions, and new information that arrives during the weekend: for example, we may adjust our programmes to accommodate
changing weather conditions. Finally, the use of the engine's «potential» – for example, the number of laps run at high revs –
is managed with the aim of getting the best racing results over both events in which the engine is used.
Does this mean
engine use has become more strategic? It is certainly more complicated now! The first point is that the increased engine life
is technically difficult to achieve, but after that, we use the engine differently in practice, qualifying and the race. Only three
years ago, we could use a different version of the engine in each session – a ‘qualifying special' for example, optimised for a
much shorter life span, and then a race spec for Sunday. Now, we must make choices on how we use a single engine, and its
performance, in each of the sessions across two weekends.
Have the first races given you an opportunity to assess the
performance of the RS25 relative to its competitors? In isolation, we were pleased with the performance of the RS25 when it
first ran on the dyno – despite very late rule changes, we hit all our performance targets before the season. However, the
isolated performance of the engine is not what matters – we always take a car-wide view of performance, and look at the V10 as
part of the whole. This prevents us from making direct comparisons of absolute engine performance relative to the competition. But
we are certainly pleased with our engine's contribution to the performance of the R25 – and with the performance of the R25-RS25
package relative to its competitors.
Following the engine failure in Bahrain, Giancarlo may race with a ‘B' specification
engine in Imola – can you update us on the status of this new engine? One of the purposes of the new regulations was to
slow down the rate of performance development, and they have succeeded: it is now more difficult to approve new parts for
introduction, and we only have a limited number of opportunities at which to introduce these parts. Our approach for 2005 will be to
introduce performance developments in packages, and the ‘B' spec is the first in a series of planned evolutions, that was
initially scheduled for introduction in Barcelona. Following Giancarlo's engine failure in Bahrain, we saw the opportunity to
accelerate the build of a race engine to this spec to fit in his car. However, the final decision on its use will depend on dyno
tests, and the detailed analysis of results from testing last week in Paul Ricard. It is important to stress that we will not be
taking any short-cuts in the approval process in order to race RS25B at Imola instead of Barcelona.
Alan Permane,
Chassis Race Engineer, Car 6
Imola places specific demands on car handling and although the circuit includes very few
high-speed corners, we nevertheless pay particular attention to a number of specific areas. The car needs to perform well under
braking and on initial turn in to the corners, while also providing good traction on corner exit. Engine power is critical, and we
are well placed with the RS25 V10.
For the chassis, the numerous chicanes must be taken into account with both our set-ups,
and how we run the cars through the weekend. In handling terms, a good change of direction at low and medium speeds is important,
while the Variante Alta and Variante Bassa place a premium on riding the kerbs well – something the R25 does better than any other
car we have produced.
The severe usage of the kerbs at the chicanes also makes reliability a key priority: if the car ‘lands'
while still at full or even partial throttle, the shock loads in the transmission can cause failures of the driveshafts or the gear
ratios themselves. Equally, we pay particular attention to the underside of the car which takes severe impacts on the kerbs: this
can break bodywork stays, or damage parts such as the front wing end plates and the front legality tray which are mounted low on the
car. We will check these regularly when the car returns to the garage.
In terms of setting up the car, we run at the downforce
levels that provide us with optimum lap-time – on our overall scale, this counts as high downforce. We are able to do this because
overtaking is difficult at Imola, owing to the relatively short straights, and we do not need to compromise downforce levels to
protect against overtaking in the race. In terms of springing the car, we have to find a compromise between riding the kerbs well
– which would push us towards softer settings – and maintaining a sharp change of direction in the slower corners – which
needs a stiffer set-up.
On the tyre side, the heavy traction demands mean that we will be monitoring rear tyre wear carefully
for the race. The cool temperatures have seen some graining occur in the past, but in terms of overall wear, we expect the levels to
be similar to Melbourne – the temperatures should be at the same sort of level, and the track surface is not particularly
abrasive.
Overall, we believe the R25 will excel at Imola. We will be running a new front wing for this race, and the car's
strengths suit the circuit: it has good traction, a strong engine and rides well on the kerbs. Our objective will be to score the
fourth win of the season.
Fabrice Lom, Engine Race Engineer, Car 6
Imola is a demanding circuit for an F1 engine:
it includes a lot of hard acceleration from slow speeds, which means outright power is an important factor. The engines spend 62% of
the lap at full throttle, a high value compared to the season average, and average engine speed is also relatively high.
The
circuit layout does not include any particularly long straights: this means that moving parts such as the pistons, which are
stressed by long periods at high revs, are not under undue strain. However, this is counterbalanced by the fact that climatic
conditions are often cool: colder temperatures mean higher air density, which in turn sees the engine develop more power. Increased
power output, of course, increases the strain placed on the V10.
The primary distinguishing characteristics of the Imola
circuit are the numerous kerbs, and the fact the drivers use them as part of the racing line. As the cars ‘jump' over them, the
rear wheels leave the ground – exposing the engine to the risk of over-revving, or excessive use of the rev limiter. For the
engine, hitting the limiter is a scenario to be avoided when possible because it increases the level of vibration on the engine.
However, it is a preferable alternative to over-revving…
The presence of kerbs does not, however, force us to put the
drivers under any unusual restrictions. We would never ask the drivers to take a corner slower in order to protect the engine, but
we often study ways of changing the line through a corner in race conditions, or to change gear earlier, in order to minimise the
risk to the engine.
